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PRINCETON  •  NEW  JERSEY 


PRESENTED  BY 

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BR  1703  .S65  1912 

Speer,  Robert  E.  1867-1947. 

Men  who  were  found  faithful 


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^o  i951 

MEN  WHO  WERE  g,,^ 
FOUND  FAITHFUL 


BY 

y 

ROBERT   e/sPEER 

Author  of 

"Some  Great  Leaders  in  the  World  Movement,"  "Young  Men 
Who  Overcame,"  *'A  Memorial  of  a  True  Life,"  etc. 


New  York         Chicago         Toronto 

Fleming  H.   Revell  Company 

London       and       Edinburgh 


Copyright,  1912,  by 
FLEMING  H.  REVELL  COMPANY 


New  York:  158  Fifth  Avenue 
Chicago:  125  N.  Wabash  Ave. 
Toronto:  25  Richmond  St.,  W. 
London:  21  Paternoster  Square 
Edinburgh:   100   Princes   Street 


PREFACE 

These  sketches  of  real  men  show  that  the 
same  Power  which  worked  upon  life  and  char- 
acter in  the  first  Christian  century  is  at  work 
in  the  world  to-day.  The  idea  that  Christ  can- 
not do  as  much  for  us  now  as  He  used  to  do 
for  men,  and  that  He  is  not  doing  as  much  now 
as  ever  in  the  history  of  the  world,  is  a  mis- 
taken idea.  In  each  new  generation  He  does 
more  and  better  for  men,  and  would  do  yet 
more  and  still  better  if  we  met  Him  with  more 
trustful  love.  Why  should  we  not  so  meet 
Him? 

Of  some  of  those  of  whom  this  book  speaks 
there  are  no  fuller  biographies,  but  of  others 
there  are  biographies  which  it  is  a  pleasure  here 
to  commend  to  any  who  would  walk  more  in- 
timately with  these  men  and  women  who  have 
walked  with  God.  Among  these  biographies 
may  be  named: 

Mrs.    Talbot's    ''  Samuel    Chapman    Arm- 
strong." 

*'The  Vision  of  a  Short  Life/'— A  Memo- 
rial of  Warren  Bartlett  Seabury. 
5 


6  Preface 

Wright's  ''  A  Life  with  a  Purpose," — A  Me- 
morial of  John  Lawrence  Thurston. 
Porter's  ''  Henry  Dickinson  Smith." 
Howard's   ''  The   Life    Story   of    H.    Clay 
Trumbull." 

"  Therefore  let  us  also,  seeing  we  are  com- 
passed about  with  so  great  a  cloud  of  wit- 
nesses, lay  aside  every  weight,  and  the  sin 
which  doth  so  easily  beset  us,  and  let  us  run 
with  patience  the  race  that  is  set  before  us, 
looking  unto  Jesus,  the  Author  and  Perfecter 
of  our  faith.  Who  for  the  joy  that  was  set  be- 
fore Him,  endured  the  cross,  despising  shame, 
and  hath  sat  down  at  the  right  hand  of  the 
throne  of  God." 


CONTENTS 


I. 

II. 

III. 

IV. 

V. 

VI. 

VII. 

VIII. 
IX. 


Samuel  Chapman  Armstrong 

Arthur  Mann 

Warren  Bartlett  Seabury 

John  Lawrence  Thurston  . 

Henry  Dickinson  Smith 

Three  Faithful  Men  of  Prayer 

Two  Short    Great  Lives  of  Fi- 
delity       .         . 

Wallace  Somerville  Faris  . 

Peter  Carter~**Son  of  Consola 
tion"  .... 

Arthur  Tappan  Pierson 

Henry  Clay  Trumbull 

William  Rogers  Richards  . 

Conclusion     .... 


9 
32 
38 

59 

72 

90 

lOI 

114 

136 
145 

171 
187 


SAMUEL  CHAPMAN  ARMSTRONG 

MANY  of  the  best  Americans  were  not 
born  in  America.  Sometimes  they 
were  born  of  foreign  parents  in  Hol- 
land, or  Germany,  or  Scotland,  or  Ireland. 
Sometimes  their  parents  were  Americans  away 
from  home  in  distant  lands,  as  merchants  or 
servants  of  the  government,  or  as  missionaries, 
and  their  children  grew  up  under  foreign  flags, 
but  with  the  American  spirit  strong  in  their 
hearts.  Samuel  Chapman  Armstrong  was  one 
of  these  children.  His  parents  were  New 
Englanders  who  had  gone  to  the  Hawaiian 
Islands  as  missionaries.  There  Richard  Arm- 
strong was  not  only  a  missionary.  At  the 
time  of  his  death,  the  reigning  King,  Kame- 
hameha,  wrote  of  him: 

"  Doctor  Armstrong  has  been  spoken  of  as 
Minister  of  Public  Instruction  and  subse- 
quently President  of  the  Board  of  Education, 
but  we  have  only  partly  described  the  impor- 
tant offices  which  he  filled.  He  was  a  member 
of  the  House  of  Nobles  and  of  the  King's 

9 


10        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

Privy  Council,  Secretary  of  the  Board  of  Trus- 
tees of  Oahu  College,  Trustee  of  the  Queen's 
Hospital,  executive  officer  of  the  Bible  and 
Tract  Society,  and  deeply  interested  in  develop- 
ing the  agricultural  resources  of  the  kingdom. 
No  other  government  officer  or  missionary 
was  brought  into  such  close  intimacy  with  the 
nation  as  a  whole." 

The  father's  energy  appeared  in  even  fuller 
measure  in  the  son.  His  mother  also  was  a 
worker.  Her  great  characteristic  was  to  do 
her  work  truthfully  and  well  and  to  seize  all 
opportunities.  His  boyhood  home  was  stern 
and  upright. 

''  In  it,"  wrote  his  daughter,  ''  justice,  truth, 
and  respect  for  duty  were  thoroughly  incul- 
cated. Both  parents  had  been  trained  in  other 
households,  where  right  was  put  before  pleas- 
ure, and  both  had  encountered  such  stress  in 
life  that  moral  strength  appeared  to  them  the 
greatest  need  of  the  growing  mind." 

Little  Samuel  was  a  blond,  slim  boy,  with 
long,  shaggy  hair,  full  of  fun,  and  overflowing 
with  life.  What  sort  of  time  he  had  as  a  boy 
he  once  described: 

"  We  had  one  real  luxury — that  of  being 
barefooted  all  the  year  round,  wearing  shoes 
on  Sunday  only,  and  then  under  protest.    The 


Samuel  Chapman  Armstrong  II 

Sunday  morning  cleaning-up  and  dressing  was 
looked  forward  to  with  dread,  as  our  sympa- 
thies were  all  with  the  natives,  who,  in  the 
early  days,  took  off  their  clothes  when  it 
rained,  so  that  a  shower  as  church  was  closing 
produced  an  extraordinary  scene.  The  ma- 
terial of  our  usual  garments  was  a  blue  denim 
of  the  cheapest  kind,  which,  to  allow  for  the 
growth  of  the  wearer,  was  made  with  two  or 
three  tucks  in  the  trousers  legs.  These  being 
successively  let  out  after  many  washings,  made 
a  series  of  humiliating  bright  blue  bands  about 
our  ankles.  I  can  remember  wearing  aprons, 
which  I  took  every  opportunity  to  discard,  al- 
though I  invariably  came  to  grief  from  so  do- 
ing, as  the  rod  in  those  days  was  laid  on 
freely.  .  .  .  Father's  chief  work  was  preach- 
ing, and  I  am  sorry  to  say  that,  although 
we  always  attended  the  services,  the  part  we 
took  in  them  was  sometimes  far  from  credita- 
ble. We  usually  sat  with  mother,  and  were 
kept  quiet  by  frequent  gingerbread,  but  I  re- 
member that  once  father  took  us  into  the  pul- 
pit and  was  obliged  to  interrupt  his  sermon  to 
settle  a  quarrel  between  us.  But  nothing  dis- 
turbed the  equanimity  of  the  natives,  not  even 
the  dog-fights,  which  were  of  frequent  occur- 
rence, for  they  doted  on  dogs,  often  bringing 
them  to  church  in  their  arms,  while  the  chil- 
dren toddled  on  behind. 

"  These  dogs  were  a  perpetual  trial.  I  have 
seen  deacons  with  long  sticks  probing  after  the 
wretched  curs  as  they  dodged  under  the  seats, 
the  preacher  scolding  roundly  the  while,  and 


12        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

not  a  smile  in  the  congregation.  .  .  .  But  the 
services  were  interesting.  .  .  . 

"  Outside  it  was  like  an  encampment ;  inside 
it  was  a  sea  of  dusky  faces.  On  one  side  was 
the  King's  pew,  with  scarlet  hangings;  the 
royal  family  always  distinguishing  themselves 
by  coming  in  very  late,  with  the  loudest  of 
squeaking  shoes.  The  more  the  shoes  squeaked 
the  better  was  the  wearer  pleased,  and  often  a 
man,  after  walking  noisily  in,  would  sit  down 
and  pass  his  shoes  through  the  window  for  his 
wife  to  wear  in,  thus  doubling  the  family  glory. 
Non-musical  shoes  were  hardly  salable." 

He  never  got  over  the  fun  of  being  a  boy. 
Indeed,  as  his  daughter  says,  and  as  all  who 
knew  him  confirm,  he  was  a  boy  all  his  life.  As 
a  boy  he  learned  that  the  end  of  life  is  duty 
and  service.  As  a  man,  he  lived  by  this  boy- 
hood lesson. 

After  his  father's  death  he  came  to  the 
United  States  by  way  of  Panama,  and  entered 
Williams  College  in  i860.  A  classmate  has 
described  what  he  was  like: 

''  There  was  a  quality  in  him  that  defied  the 
ordinary  English  vocabulary.  To  use  the 
Eastern  Tennessee  dialect,  which  alone  could 
do  him  justice,  he  was  '  plumb  survigrous.' 
.  .  .  His  '  plumb  survigrousness  '  gave  him  an 
eternal  effervescence;  in  fact,  his  body  was  a 
kind  of  catapult  for  his  mind;  it  was  forever 
projecting  his  mental  force  in  some  direction, 


Samuel  Chapman  Armstrong  13 

so  that  he  was  continually  carrying  on  intel- 
lectual '  high  jinks  ' — going  off  into  extrava- 
ganzas, throwing  every  subject  into  grotesque 
light ;  as  a  result,  he  was  never  serious,  though 
always  earnest.  He  took  to  Williams  College 
as  to  a  natural  habitat;  he  lifted  up  his  '  plumb 
survigrous  '  voice  and  made  intellectual  pande- 
monium at  the  dinner  table. 

"  He  was  a  trifle  above  middle  height,  broad- 
shouldered,  with  large,  well-poised  head,  fore- 
head high  and  wide,  deep-set  flashing  eyes,  a 
long  mane  of  light-brown  hair,  his  face  very 
brown  and  sailor-like.  He  bore  his  head  high 
and  carried  about  an  air  of  insolent  good 
health.  He  was  unconventional  in  his  notions, 
Shakesperean  in  sympathy,  and  wished  to  see 
all  sides  of  life,  yet  he  never  formed  aftilia- 
tions  with  the  bad  side.  If  he  touched  pitch, 
he  got  rid  of  it  as  soon  as  he  could — pleas- 
antly if  possible,  but  at  all  events  decidedly; 
he  had  a  robust  habit  of  will,  and  laid  hold  al- 
ways of  the  best  in  his  environment. 

"  Intellectually  he  was  a  leader.  Spiritually 
he  was  religious,  with  a  deep  reverence  for 
his  father's  life  and  work.  .  .  .  Yet  all  felt 
him  to  be  under  great  terrestrial  headway. 
Sometimes  he  seemed  to  have  little  respect  for 
the  spiritual;  he  shocked  people  by  his  levity 
and  irreverence.  Yet  there  was  about  him  at  all 
times  a  profound  reverence  of  spirit  for  God, 
manhood,  womanhood,  and  all  sacred  realities. 
Indeed,  with  him  reverence  and  religion  alike 
were  matters  not  of  form,  but  of  inward  prin- 
ciple, whose  application  he  had  not  yet  mas- 


14        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

tered.  Other  men  were  original  in  thought; 
he  was  original  in  character;  but,  above  all, 
there  was  an  immediacy  of  nature.  His  great 
tendency  seemed  to  be  to  go  ahead ;  he  has,  in 
fact,  often  reminded  me  of  Harry  Wadsworth, 
the  hero  of  E.  E.  Hale's  '  Ten  Times  One  is 
Ten.'  He  was  the  most  strenuous  man  I  ever 
saw." 


He  paid  two  dollars  a  week  for  his  board, 
and  he  thought  his  own  thoughts  and  lived  his 
own  cheery  life.  ''  There  is  only  one  thing 
that  will  keep  you  up  at  home,"  he  wrote  home, 
*'  and  that  is  cheerfulness ;  you  must  secure 
that  at  all  events;  if  necessary,  fill  the  house 
with  cats  from  top  to  bottom,  tie  a  dog  to 
every  lilac,  and  place  monkeys  in  every  tree; 
at  any  rate,  keep  cheerful.  There  is  no  use  in 
melancholy,  which  is  dangerous." 

*'  In  college,"  he  wrote,  "  I  belong  to  no 
secret  society  and  must  rely  on  my  own  merits 
for  getting  friends;  when  one  joins  a  secret 
society  all  in  it  are  sworn  friends,  right  or 
wrong;  this  is  childish."  ''  I  think  I  have  be- 
come a  better  Christian  than  I  used  to  be," 
he  wrote  in  '6i.  "  I  look  forward  with  joy  to 
a  life  of  doing  good."  The  summer  of  1861 
he  spent  in  a  walking-trip  in  the  Adirondacks, 
but  he  had  poor  luck  as  a  sportsman.  "  It 
makes  me  feel  riled,  sarcastic,  cruel,  and  al- 


Samuel  Chapman  Armstrong  15 

most  like  crying  when  I  think  of  those  pesky 
fish.  ...  At  times  I  felt  furious ;  occasionally 
it  seemed  like  a  good  joke,  and  now  and  then 
I  would  moralize  as  my  neglected  hook  lay 
beneath  the  glassy  waters.  Did  it  indicate 
that  suasion  was  not  my  forte?  It  certainly 
showed  that  fishing  wasn't,  and  fishing  is  only 
an  appeal  to  the  highest  faculties  of  fishes." 
He  had  as  bad  luck  with  deer.  It  turned  out 
that  he  could  catch  men,  however. 

In  1862  he  was  graduated  from  Williams, 
very  grateful  for  all  that  he  had  received 
there,  especially  through  President  Mark  Hop- 
kins, in  whose  home  he  had  lived  the  last  part 
of  his  course.  As  he  faced  life,  his  first  duty 
seemed  to  be  to  take  his  part  in  the  great 
struggle  that  had  begun  over  slavery.  He 
went  to  Troy,  recruited  a  company  of  which 
he  became  captain,  and  set  out  for  the  war 
with  the  125th  Regiment  of  New  York  Volun- 
teers. He  had  not  been  long  in  the  field  when 
he  and  his  regiment  and  over  ten  thousand 
other  Federal  troops  were  captured  by  Stone- 
wall Jackson  at  Harper's  Ferry  and  paroled. 
"  We  were  most  civilly  treated  by  the  rebels," 
he  wrote,  "  whom  we  found  to  be  in  truth 
*  bone  of  our  bone  and  flesh  of  our  flesh  ' ;  men 
like  ourselves;  only  the  rebels  were  not  nearly 
as  profane  as  our  men — in  fact,  they  used  no 


i6       Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

profane  language  at  all.  They  shamed  us; 
they  fought,  they  said,  not  for  money,  but  for 
their  homes,  and  wanted  the  war  to  cease. 
Our  system  of  munificent  bounties  and  fine 
clothing  diverts  us  from  the  principle  for 
which  we  are  contending,  and  few  of  us  really 
know  what  we  are  fighting  for.  I  felt  the 
want  of  a  clear  apprehension  of  it  in  the  hour 
of  danger." 

The  regiment  was  away  two  months,  and 
then  was  returned  for  further  duty,  but  for 
some  time  it  took  part  in  no  engagement.  It 
tasted  battle  enough,  however,  at  Gettysburg, 
where  it  lost  one-fifth  of  the  men.  *'  This  was 
our  first  fight — my  first,"  wrote  Armstrong, 
*'  a  long  and  great  curiosity  was  satisfied. 
Men  fell  dead  all  around  me.  The  sergeant 
who  stands  behind  me  when  in  line  was  killed, 
and  heaps  were  wounded.  In  the  charge  after 
the  rebs  I  was  pleasantly,  though,  perhaps, 
dangerously,  situated.  I  did  not  allow  a  man 
to  get  ahead  of  me.  I  felt  no  fear,  though  I 
never  forgot  that  any  moment  I  might  fall. 
The  responsibility  and  the  high  duty  assigned 
me  sustained  me,  and  it  was  wonderful  that 
my  own  men  didn't  shoot  me;  they  were  so 
excited  and  were  behind  me.  .  .  .  Don't  be 
anxious  for  me.  The  God  above  does  all 
things   well.     There   are  more   battles  to   be 


Samuel  Chapman  Armstrong  17 

fought,  and  I  must  fight.  My  sensations  in 
battle  are  not  strange.  I  feel  simply  resolved 
to  do  my  best,  to  lead  my  men,  and  to  accept 
my  fate  like  a  man." 

Some  time  after  Gettysburg,  he  took  com- 
mand as  colonel  of  the  Ninth  Regiment  of 
United  States  coloured  troops.  He  threw  his 
whole  soul  into  this  new  work,  and  soon  got 
his  soldiers  into  shape.  "  We  expect  to  beat 
everything  around  in  everything,  and  we  are  in 
a  fair  way  to  do  it,"  he  wrote.  He  had  learned 
in  his  captaincy  of  white  troops  the  lesson  of 
responsibility,  of  the  power  of  unselfish  and 
fearless  leadership.  He  had  come  to  see 
clearly,  too,  the  principle  for  which  the  war 
was  being  fought,  and  he  was  resolved  to  make 
men  of  his  negroes,  and  he  came  to  see  the 
possibility  and  duty  of  the  nation's  making 
men  of  its  negroes.  He  put  reality  into  the 
song  which  the  coloured  soldiers  sang : 

"  We  want  no  cowards  in  our  band 
That  will  their  colours  fly; 
We  call  for  valiant-hearted  men 
Who're  not  afraid  to  die." 

His  men  learned  to  die.  And  as  he  taught 
them  this,  he  began  to  feel  his  way  to  the  duty 
of  teaching  men  to  live. 

He  left  the  war  with  the  title  of  Brigadier- 


1 8        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

General,  and  was  sent  off  with  his  regiment  to 
Texas.  "  I  find,"  he  wrote  from  Ringgold 
Barracks,  "  that  I  am  not  polite  and  accom- 
plished. I  aim  rather  to  be  just  and  manly, 
and  patiently  seek  to  realize  the  higher,  more 
heroic  qualities.  These  are  a  guarantee  of 
success,  not  what  is  commonly  called  so,  but 
of  that  fulness  and  completeness  in  character 
that  gives  an  inner  and  calm  and  rich  assur- 
ance that  one  is  a  true  man  and  makes  one 
satisfied,  no  matter  how  circumstances  may 
change.  This  inner  strength  is  the  thing,  and 
it  is  completed,  perfected,  and  made  glorious 
by  religion.  Thus  one,  though  poor  and  un- 
noticed, may  be  greater,  grander,  and  far  more 
beautiful  than  anything  that  is  made  of  the 
costliest  stone.  .  .  .  Good  people  try  to  do  too 
much  to  dodge  the  devil  and  to  build  up  a  wall 
to  keep  him  out.  What  does  he  do?  He 
helps  build  the  wall.  Meet  him  squarely; 
fight  the  inner  battle  of  self,  and  outward 
forms — moralities — will  take  care  of  them- 
selves." 

In  the  fall  of  1865  he  received  his  discharge 
from  the  army.  This  brought  him  face  to 
face  with  the  question  of  his  life  work.  He 
was  now  twenty-six  years  of  age.  At  first 
he  thought  of  business.  "'  I  expect  to  begin 
at  the  bottom  of  the  ladder,"  he  wrote  to  his 


Samuel  Chapman  Armstrong  19 

mother,  *'  and  work  along.  Don't  expect  to 
study  a  profession.  I  think  I  shall  get  into 
the  right  place  by  and  by."  But  his  thoughts 
soon  turned  toward  the  great  moral  struggle 
of  the  nation,  which  was  to  succeed  the  phys- 
ical strife.  ''  There  may  be  a  place  for  me," 
he  wrote,  **  in  the  struggle  for  right  and  wrong 
in  this  country.  .  .  .  My  capabilities  are  of 
an  executive  nature,  and  I  shall  seek  some 
chance  of  usefulness  where  I  can  use  my  tal- 
ents to  the  most  advantage  and  for  the  cause  of 
humanity. 

"  My  purpose  is  to  serve  the  Great  Master 
in  some  way  as  well  as  I  can;  to  be  of  use  to 
my  fellow  men;  to  give  the  life  so  marvel- 
lously spared  and  wonderfully  blessed  to  the 
Source  of  all  mercy  and  blessing.  I  shall  prob- 
ably not  enter  the  ministry;  am  not  made  for 
a  preacher.  I  should  rather  minister  than  be 
a  minister." 

He  was  not  afraid  of  the  uncertainty  of  the 
future.  "  There  is  something  in  this  stand- 
ing face  to  face  with  destiny,"  he  said,  ''  look- 
ing into  its  darkness,  that  is  inspiring;  it  ap- 
peals to  manhood ;  it  is  thrilling,  like  going  into 
action." 

He  soon  found  his  next  work  in  the  newly 
established  Freedmen's  Bureau,  which  was 
made  a  department  of  the  Government  by  Con- 


20       Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

gress  in  1865,  and  put  in  charge  of  General 
O.  O.  Howard.  The  ex-slaves  had  to  be 
looked  after,  their  relations  to  their  former 
masters  settled,  land  troubles  arranged,  hos- 
pitals, asylums,  and  schools  established.  What 
was  to  be  done  with  the  negro  and  for  him, 
and  how  was  he  to  be  made  into  a  capable  and 
self-governing  man?  This  was  the  nation's 
problem.  It  became  the  problem  of  Arm- 
strong's life.  He  offered  his  services  to  the 
Freedmen's  Bureau,  and  was  sent  into  Vir- 
ginia to  take  charge  of  a  great  company  of 
contraband  negroes,  and  to  be  superintendent 
of  schools  over  a  large  area.  He  laid  hold  of 
his  hard  task  with  characteristic  energy. 
''  There  is  not  much  peace,"  he  wrote;  "  work 
comes  on  all  days  of  the  week,  Sunday  not 
excepted.  I  like  it — there  is  a  large  field  and 
lots  to  do.  .  .  .  General  Howard  told  me  it 
was  the  hardest  position  to  fill  he  had;  there 
is  such  ill  feeling  between  whites  and  blacks, 
so  many  paupers,  so  much  idleness,  and  such 
an  enormous  population.  Shine,  ye  lucky 
stars!  .  .  .  The  work  is  splendid,  and  if  God 
leads  me  as  He  has  done,  I  shall  have  nothing 
to  fear — all  will  be  well." 

Hampton  was  his  headquarters,  and  the 
more  he  studied  his  problem,  the  more  con- 
vinced he  became  that  there  was  only  one  solu- 


Samuel  Chapman  Armstrong  21 

tion.  He  adjusted  the  land  troubles.  "  Col- 
oured squatters  by  thousands,"  he  wrote,  ''  and 
General  Lee's  disbanded  soldiers  returning  to 
their  families  came  together  in  my  district 
on  hundreds  of  '  abandoned '  farms,  which 
the  Government  had  seized  and  allowed  the 
freedmen  to  occupy.  There  was  irritation,  but 
both  classes  were  ready  to  do  the  fair  thing. 
It  was  about  a  two  years'  task  to  settle  mat- 
ters by  making  terms  with  the  landowners,  who 
employed  many  labourers  on  their  restored 
homes.  Swarms  went  back  to  the  '  old  planta- 
tion '  on  passes,  with  thirty  days'  rations. 

"  Hardest  of  all  was  to  settle  the  ration 
question;  about  2,000  having  been  fed  for 
years  were  demoralized  and  seemed  hopeless. 
Notice  was  given  that  in  three  months,  on  Oc- 
tober I,  1866,  all  rations  would  be  stopped 
except  to  those  in  hospital,  for  whom  full 
provision  was  made.  Trouble  was  expected, 
but  there  was  not  a  ripple  of  it,  or  a  com- 
plaint that  day.  Their  resource  was  surpris- 
ing.    The  negro  in  a  tight  place  is  a  genius." 

But  the  adjustment  of  the  land  question  dealt 
with  only  a  superficial  aspect  of  the  problem. 
The  negro  must  be  educated.  As  he  said,  "  The 
education  of  the  freedmen  is  the  great  work 
of  the  day;  it  is  their  only  hope,  the  only  power 
that  can  lift  them  up  as  a  people,  and  I  think 


22       Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

every  encouragement  should  be  given  to 
schools  established  for  their  benefit.  .  .  .  The 
North  generally  thinks  that  the  great  thing 
is  to  free  the  negro  from  his  former  owners; 
the  real  thing  is  to  save  him  from  himself. 
'  Gumption,'  perception,  guiding  instincts, 
rather  than  a  capacity  to  learn,  are  the  ad- 
vantages of  our  more  favoured  race." 

The  Freedmen's  Bureau  did  not  have  a  very 
long  life,  but  Armstrong  served  it  to  the  last. 
Before  his  salary  from  it  ceased  in  1872,  how- 
ever, he  had  begun  to  lay  the  foundation  of  the 
institute  at  Hampton  which  he  built  up  into 
one  of  the  most  famous  institutions  in  Amer- 
ica, and  left  as  his  abiding  monument.  His 
idea,  as  he  later  expressed  it,  was  this : 

"  To  train  selected  negro  youths  who  should 
go  out  and  teach  and  lead  their  people,  first 
by  example,  by  getting  land  and  homes ;  to  give 
them  not  a  dollar  that  they  could  earn  for 
themselves;  to  teach  respect  for  labour,  to  re- 
place stupid  drudgery  with  skilled  hands,  and 
to  those  ends  to  build  up  an  industrial  system 
for  the  sake  not  only  of  self-support  and  in- 
telligent labour,  but  also  for  the  sake  of  char- 
acter." 

The  American  Missionary  Association  pro- 
vided the  first  money  which,  with  a  gift  from 
the  Avery  estate,  purchased  the  first  ground 
and  buildings.     It  was  a  great  experiment  on 


Samuel  Chapman  Armstrong  23 

which  he  launched  out.  "  The  ground  is 
new,"  he  wrote.  "  The  enterprise  is  as  full  of 
bad  possibilities  as  of  good  ones ;  most  embar- 
rassing conditions  will  occur  from  time  to 
time;  all  is  experiment,  but  all  is  hopeful.  The 
success  of  this  will  be  the  guarantee  of  a  dozen 
more  like  it  in  the  South.  I  have  to  face  the 
fact  that  a  manual-labour  school  never  yet  suc- 
ceeded in  the  North,  but  the  powers  of  prayer 
and  faith  are  strong — in  these  we  will  con- 
quer. 

"  I  am  in  the  midst  of  the  battle  now. 
Worked  very  hard.  Just  about  to  open.  Ap- 
plicants are  coming  forward  encouragingly. 
Truly  the  pillar  of  cloud  is  before  us.  Every 
serious  difficulty  seems  to  be  removed.  What 
can  resist  the  pressure  of  steady,  energetic 
pressure,  the  force  of  a  single  right  idea  pushed 
month  after  month  in  its  natural  development? 
If  I  succeed,  it  will  be  because  of  carefully  se- 
lecting a  thing  to  do  and  the  doing  of  it.  Few 
men  comprehend  the  deep  philosophy  of  one- 
man  power.  As  a  soldier,  I  would  always 
fight  on  the  principle  of  all  great  warriors, 
*  concentration  and  celerity.'  As  an  educator, 
as  anything,  I  would  apply  that  same  always 
sound  principle,  adding  to  it  with  reference  to 
enemies  or  any  other  obstacle,  *  Divide  and  be 
conquered.'  " 


24        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

But  though  the  problem  was  hard  and  the 
solution  difficult,  success  was  certain  with  such 
a  moral  engine  as  Armstrong  back  of  it.  ''  The 
great  thing,"  he  said,  "  is  to  be  right  and 
true.  The  second  thing  is  to  be  transparent." 
And  he  was  this.  At  first  he  took  no  salary. 
"  Some  of  my  friends  don't  like  this,"  he  said, 
"  but  they  little  know  the  way  of  successful 
leadership.  The  rebel  officers  fought  without 
pay,  and  why  should  not  I  in  a  ten  times  bet- 
ter cause?  I  have  so  far  had  everything 
needed  for  personal  comfort,  yes,  a  jolly  good 
time  on  the  whole,  with  an  occasional  grind 
and  sometimes  an  impecunious  sensation." 

He  visited  Boston  and  the  North,  but  there 
came  no  waverings  now  as  to  his  duty.  He 
hungered  for  hard  work.  "  I  have  been  over 
the  '  Athens,'  "  he  wrote  from  Boston,  "  but 
wouldn't  live  here  for  anything.  I  am  glad 
I'm  on  the  outposts  doing  frontier  duty  and 
pioneer  work,  for  the  South  is  a  heathen  land, 
and  Hampton  is  on  the  borders  thereof.  I 
see  my  whole  nature  calls  me  to  the  work  that 
is  done  there — to  lay  foundations  strong,  and 
not  do  frescoes  and  fancy  work." 

His  great  object  was  to  erect  an  institution 
which  would  make  men  and  women,  creating 
character  in  them,  and  thus  show  the  way  the 
negro  problem  could  be  coped  with  all  over 


Samuel  Chapman  Armstrong  25 

the  land.  The  education  provided  must  be 
suited  to  the  student,  to  the  life  he  came  from, 
and  the  life  he  was  going  to.  The  "  heart  of 
all  his  work,"  says  his  daughter,  "  was  the  ar- 
rangement of  an  effective,  practical  routine  of 
hand  and  head  work,  the  preservation  of  such 
an  atmosphere  of  energy  and  devotion  that  no 
student  could  fail  to  be  impressed  by  it." 

"  There  is  little  mischief  done,"  said  Gen- 
eral Armstrong,  "  where  there  is  no  time  for 
it;  activity  is  a  purifier."  He  was  alive  with 
such  sayings  as  these:  "  There  is  no  place  for 
the  lazy  man  in  this  world  or  the  next."  "  Hu- 
man, therefore  imperfect;  human,  therefore 
capable  of  improvement."  "  If  we  were  not 
working  for  200  years,  then  this  [the  failure 
of  a  promising  pupil]  might  be  discouraging." 
"  Laughter  makes  sport  of  work."  ''  Many 
people  are  good,  but  good  for  nothing;  work- 
ing together  is  as  important  as  working  at  all." 
"  Doing  w^hat  can't  be  done  is  the  glory  of  liv- 
ing." This  was  the  spirit  of  his  own  life 
through  and  through.  "  Hopeless  ones,"  he 
declared,  "  are  only  grave-diggers  for  them- 
selves and  the  rest."  He  once  sprang  up  at  a 
meeting  at  Lake  Mohonk,  New  York,  when 
an  objection  was  made  that  a  certain  course 
approved  by  him  was  "  impossible."  "  What 
are  Christians  put  into  the  world  for  but  to 


26        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

do  the  impossible  in  the  strength  of  God?  "  he 
exclaimed.  This  sentiment  he  commonly  ex- 
pressed in  the  following  story — for  feeling 
and  fun  played  twin  parts  in  his  conversation : 

"  Once  there  was  a  woodchuck.  .  .  .  Now, 
woodchucks  can't  climb  trees.  Well,  this 
woodchuck  was  chafed  by  a  dog  and  came  to 
a  tree.  He  knew  that  if  he  could  get  up  this 
tree  the  dog  could  not  catch  him.  Now, 
woodchucks  can't  climb  trees,  but  he  had  to, 
so  he  did." 

It  was  the  impossible  which  he  had  to  do. 
The  only  way  to  get  money  for  his  work  was 
to  come  North  after  it,  and  to  go  about  seeking 
it.  He  had  to  contend  against  ignorance  and 
indifference.  "  It  is  fearful,"  he  wrote,  ''  to 
throw  one's  self  against  the  popular  current, 
and  it  is  the  most  exhausting  thing  I  ever 
tried." 

The  old  abolition  spirit  was  satisfied  with 
the  destruction  of  slavery.  The  very  night  of 
the  first  public  meeting  in  New  England  in  be- 
half of  his  work,  all  that  was  left  of  the  old 
Abolition  Society  met  to  lay  down  its  arms 
and  give  up  its  organization,  resolved  that 
nothing  remained  for  it  to  do.  "  It  failed  to 
see,"  as  General  Armstrong  says,  "  that  every- 
thing remained.     Their  work  was  just  begin- 


Samuel  Chapman  Armstrong  27 

ning  when  slavery  was  abolished."  But  he 
was  bound  to  succeed,  whatever  he  had  to  over- 
come. His  letters  from  year  to  year  show  the 
struggle  and  the  confidence  of  victory.  ''  I 
was  forced  to  get  money  to  pay  the  pressing 
way  of  the  school  or  let  it  go  to  the  wall,  and  at 
it  I  went  with  all  my  might  and  haven't  had 
a  day's  rest  for  two  months.  It  is  hard — this 
begging;  it  takes  all  one's  nervous  and  phys- 
ical strength,  even  when  people  are  kind  and 
polite,  as  they  generally  are.  .  .  .  Am  rushing 
about  all  the  time,  and  necessity  is  after  me 
sharp.  .  .  .  Am  going  to  drive  things  while 
there's  any  life  in  me.  I  am  well  and  think  I 
can  stand  it;  success  is  the  best  medicine  and 
will  cure  me.  .  .  .  This  is  a  rough  and  ter- 
rible fight  with  difficulties,  but  I  think  I'm  on 
top.  .  .  The  stake  of  my  destiny  is  planted 
here,  and  I  have  never  regretted  it ;  this  is  part 
of  the  war  on  a  higher  plane,  and  with  spiritual 
weapons;  it  will  not  soon  end,  and  success  is 
yet  to  be  won.  I  cannot  understand  the  pre- 
vailing views  of  the  war  among  pious  and  in- 
telligent Americans.  It  is  simply  barbaric — 
to  whip  the  South  and  go  home  rejoicing;  to 
build  monuments  of  victory,  leaving  one-third 
of  their  countrymen  in  the  depths  of  distress. 
The  case  is  chiefly  moral,  and  the  duty  sits 
very  lightly  on  the  general  conscience." 


28        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

i 

From  1878  to  1890  eighteen  buildings  cost-  ] 

ing  $423,400  were   erected,   more   land   was  j 

bought,  the  number  of  students  grew  from  300  j 

to  678,  and  from  $50,000  to  $80,000  annually  \ 

had  to  be  raised  for  the  support  of  the  School. 

It  was  hard  work,  but  it  had  to  be  done.     As  j 

he  said,  *'  Once  there  was  an  old  darky  who 

could  not  be  dissuaded   from  hunting  in  an  I 

empty  'possum  hole.     '  Ain't  no   'possum  in  j 

dat  hole?    Dey's  just  got  to  be,  'cause  dey's  1 

nuffin'  in  de  house  fer  supper ! '  "    So  he  went 

at  his  task,  rejoicing  in  the  hardness  of  it.  j 

*'  God's  hand,"  he  declared,   "  points  to  a  j 

steep  and  craggy  height — it  must  be  climbed —  ; 

I  will  climb  it."  ..."  I  have  had  a  taste  of  I 

blood,"  he  said;  "  that  is,  I  have  had  the  taste  \ 
of   life   and   work — cannot   live    without   the           '      \ 

arena.     I  must  be  in  it.     Despair  shakes  his  : 

skinny  hands  and  glares  his  hideous  eyes  on  i 

me  to  little  purpose.     I  feel  happy  when  all  ■ 

my  powers  of  resistance  are  taxed."  i 

■J 

From  1878  on,  Indian  students  were  taught 

with  the  negro  students  at  Hampton.     "  The  i 

Indians,"   he   said,    "  are   grown-up   children.  1 

We  are  a  thousand  years  ahead  of  them  in  the  [ 

i 

line  of  development.     Education  is  not  prog- 
ress, but  is  a  means  of  it.     A  brain  full  of  j 
book  knowledge,  whose  physical  basis  is  the  i 
product  of  centuries  of  barbarism,  is  an  ab-  . 


Samuel  Chapman  Armstrong  29 

surdity  that  we  do  not  half  realize,  from  our 
excessive  traditional  reverence  for  school  and 
college  training.  We  forget  that  knowledge 
is  not  power  unless  it  is  digested  and  assim- 
ilated. Savages  have  good  memories ;  they  ac- 
quire, but  do  not  comprehend;  they  devour, 
but  do  not  digest  knowledge.  They  have  no 
conception  of  mental  discipline.  A  well-bal- 
anced mind  is  attained  only  after  centuries  of 
development." 

He  believed  the  negro,  trained  to  labour,  was 
stronger  than  the  Indian,  and  that  their  educa- 
tion together,  while  novel,  would  be  better  for 
each.  Later  he  felt  that  the  Indian  problem 
could  be  handled  best  on  the  reservations,  al- 
though there  would  be  a  few  young  men  and 
women  who  could  wisely  be  brought  East.  His 
interest  in  the  negro  extended  to  all  the  needy 
races. 

So  the  virile,  tireless  life  was  lived  out.  The 
end  came  in  1893,  after  a  good  struggle  such 
as  he  had  ever  made  against  whatever  opposed 
his  work.  While  delivering  a  speech  in  Mas- 
sachusetts in  1 89 1,  he  was  stricken  with 
paralysis.  He  determined  to  get  well,  how- 
ever, and  was  moved  back  to  Hampton,  where, 
wheeled  about  in  a  chair,  he  went  on  with  his 
work,  but  the  day  the  fleets  of  all  nations, 
which  had  met  at  Old  Point  Comfort  prepara- 


30        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

tory  to  the  Naval  Review  in  New  York  Har- 
bor in  1893,  sailed  for  New  York,  he  was 
stricken  again,  and  on  May  nth,  saying  sim- 
ply, "  My  work  is  done,  I  must  go,"  went  out, 
as  the  ships  had  gone,  to  the  haven  where 
he  would  be.  "  I  wish  to  be  buried,"  he  had 
written  in  some  memoranda  found  among  his 
private  papers,  "  in  the  school  graveyard, 
among  the  students,  where  one  of  them  would 
have  been  put  had  he  died  next. 

"  I  wish  no  monument  or  fuss  whatever  over 
my  grave ;  only  a  simple  headstone,  no  text  or 
sentiment  inscribed,  only  my  name  and  date. 
I  wish  the  simplest  funeral  service,  without 
sermon  or  attempt  at  oratory — a  soldier's 
funeral. 

*'  I  hope  that  there  will  be  enough  friends  to 
see  that  the  work  of  the  school  shall  continue. 
Unless  some  shall  make  sacrifice  for  it,  it  can- 
not go  on. 

"  A  work  that  requires  no  sacrifice  does  not 
count  for  much  in  fulfilling  God's  plans.  But 
what  is  commonly  called  sacrifice  is  the  best, 
happiest  use  of  one's  self  and  one's  resources 
— ^the  best  investment  of  time,  strength,  and 
means.  He  who  makes  no  such  sacrifice  is 
most  to  be  pitied.  He  is  a  heathen,  because  he 
knows  nothing  of  God." 

Samuel  Armstrong  knew  God.     He  was  ac- 


Samuel  Chapman  Armstrong  31 

customed  to  spend  a  tenth  of  his  busiest  days 
in  prayer.  He  conceived  life  to  be  a  simple 
service  of  God  in  the  consciousness  of  His 
presence.  ''  The  longer  I  live,"  he  once  wrote, 
"  the  less  I  think  and  fear  about  what  the 
world  calls  success;  the  more  I  tremble  for 
true  success,  for  the  perfection  and  beauty  of 
the  inner  life,  for  the  purity  and  sanctity  of 
the  soul,  which  is  as  a  temple.  As  I  grow 
older  I  feel  the  need  of  getting  at  the  root  of 
the  matter — of  being  sure  of  the  nearness  of 
God,  of  being  free  from  all  the  mistiness  and 
doubts  and  of  throwing  the  increasing  cares 
of  life  on  Him." 

To  the  very  roots  of  life  he  came.  And  he 
came  to  them  early,  not  late.  Therefore,  while 
he  lived,  he  lived;  and  when  the  end  came  it 
was  a  life,  a  strong,  full  life  that  ended — and 
began. 


II 

ARTHUR  MANN 

A  CLEAN,  true  life,  lived  for  Christ  and 
for  men,  and  a  courageous  death — 
what  more  could  any  man  ask?    The 
number  of  years  of  existence  is  of  small  con- 
sequence, if  one  fills  such  years  as  he  has  with 
duty. 

Arthur  Mann  was  born  in  Buffalo  in  1879, 
in  a  useful  and  influential  home.  His  father 
is  one  of  the  leading  physicians  not  only  of 
Buffalo,  but  of  the  country,  and  was  one  of 
those  in  charge  of  President  McKinley's  case 
during  his  last  illness,  after  his  assassination. 
Arthur  grew  up  in  Buffalo,  receiving  his  early 
education  at  the  Heathcote  School.  From 
early  boyhood  he  was  interested  in  the  life  and 
work  of  St.  Paul's  Episcopal  Church  in  Buf- 
falo. When  years  afterwards  the  rector  was 
told  the  tidings  of  Arthur's  death  in  China,  he 
replied : 

"  He  was  a  young  man  of  unblemished  rep- 
utation.    He   was   an  active   worker   in   our 

32 


Arthur  Mann  33 

church,  a  man  of  high  ideals,  who  thought 
most  of  all  how  he  might  hest  serve  God  and 
his  fellow-men.  A  splendid  career  was  open 
to  him  in  America,  yet  he  chose  to  go  to  China, 
for  he  saw  that  there  was  the  greater  need. 
We  felt  when  he  went  there  that  the  church 
was  sending  its  best  to  that  field." 

In  1895  he  entered  Yale  University,  where 
he  made  a  fine  record,  and  was  graduated  in 
1899  with  high  honors,  winning  the  university 
prize  for  the  best  poem.  After  being  gradu- 
ated from  Yale  he  entered  the  General  Theo- 
logical Seminary  in  New  York  to  prepare  for 
the  ministry.  While  a  student  there  he  heard 
Bishop  Graves  make  an  appeal  to  the  students 
for  volunteers  for  the  China  mission.  He  de- 
termined to  offer  himself.  After  being  gradu- 
ated in  1902,  with  the  degree  of  B.D.,  he  was 
anxious  to  start  for  the  foreign  field  imme- 
diately, but  was  unable  to  do  this,  as  the  Bishop 
of  Western  New  York  desired  him  to  spend 
his  diaconate  in  work  in  the  diocese  where  he 
had  been  a  candidate. 

After  his  year's  work  in  connection  with  St. 
Paul's  Church,  Buffalo,  New  York,  where  he 
was  in  charge  of  a  successful  mission  and  made 
many  friends,  he  was  free  to  take  up  the  work 
to  which  he  had  dedicated  himself.  He  sailed, 
accordingly,  for  China,  to  take  up  work  in  St. 


34        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

John's  College  at  Shanghai,  of  which  F.  L. 
Hawks  Pott,  D.D.,  is  president.  Dr.  Pott 
says: 

"  Arriving  in  Shanghai  the  latter  part  of 
January,  1904,  he  entered  into  his  new  life 
with  the  greatest  enthusiasm  and  zeal,  and 
soon  proved  himself  an  invaluable  helper. 
Having  marked  linguistic  ability,  he  made 
good  progress  with  the  Chinese  language,  and 
laid  the  foundation  of  an  accurate  scholarship. 
He  soon  won  the  confidence  of  the  students  at 
the  college  by  the  faithful  and  painstaking 
work  done  in  the  classroom  and  by  entering 
into  all  their  interests.  He  encouraged  them 
to  come  to  him  with  all  their  difficulties,  and 
frequently  one  would  find  them  in  his  rooms 
talking  with  him,  and  getting  his  advice  and 
help.  He  never  begrudged  his  time  to  any  one 
who  wished  to  see  him. 

"  A  large  part  of  the  athletic  successes  of 
the  students  was  due  to  the  time  he  spent 
in  training  the  young  men,  and  in  developing 
enthusiasm  for  manly  sport.  Whenever  delin- 
quent students  had  to  be  dealt  with  at  the  meet- 
ings of  the  faculty,  one  could  count  upon 
Arthur  Mann's  taking  the  most  charitable  view 
of  the  case,  and  putting  in  the  plea  for  the 
greatest  leniency  possible. 

"  In  order  to  make  more  rapid  progress  with 
the  language,  for  a  time  he  left  the  college 
compound  and  went  off  and  lived  by  himself 
in  a  Chinese  village,  where  he  could  hear  no 
English  spoken  and  where  he  had  to  depend 


Arthur  Mann  35 

entirely  on  his  Chinese  associates  for  social 
intercourse.  Owing  to  a  vacancy  in  the 
faculty,  caused  by  the  retirement  of  one  of 
the  professors,  we  were  soon  obliged  to  call 
him  back  to  the  college  to  take  up  again  the 
work  of  teaching. 

''  In  the  religious  life  of  the  college,  as  his 
knowledge  of  Chinese  increased,  he  was  be- 
ginning to  take  a  greater  part.  He  was  able 
to  read  the  services  and  to  preach  in  Chinese, 
but  his  strongest  influence  was  exerted  in  his 
personal  dealings  with  the  young  men.  In 
the  theological  department  especially  he  was 
most  stimulating  to  his  students.  He  put  be- 
fore them  the  highest  ideals,  both  in  regard  to 
the  Christian  character  and  the  work  of  the 
minister  of  Christ.  I  think  one  of  the  great- 
est compliments  ever  uttered  in  regard  to  him 
was  that  of  one  of  his  Chinese  associates,  who 
said,  '  The  Professor  Mann,  he  has  absolutely 
no  bad  traits  of  character.'  Many  of  the 
young  men  have  told  me  how  much  they  owe 
to  him,  because  he  first  taught  them  to  think 
for  themselves  and  to  see  clearly  what  was 
necessary  to  make  their  country  strong  and 
prosperous." 

"  I  am  here  for  work,"  was  his  principle,  as 
he  wrote  in  a  letter,  ''  and  I  am  going  to  make 
that  tell." 

While  busy  in  his  work  he  was  still  always 
studying  and  preparing  for  better  work  and 
putting  his  mind  to  side  emplo3mients  which 


36        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

were  worth  while  in  themselves  and  which 
made  it  a  better  mind.  About  a  year  before 
his  death  he  wrote  a  romantic  tragedy  in  five 
acts  entitled  "  Prince  Ivo."  The  book  was 
very  favourably  reviewed  by  the  papers.  The 
keynote  of  the  drama  is  the  sacrifice  that  a 
man  will  make  for  his  friend.  It  glorifies 
friendship  even  to  the  height  of  complete  self- 
sacrifice.  In  the  drama  friend  dies  with  friend. 
It  was  just  so  that  Arthur  Mann  died.  He 
was  spending  his  vacation  in  China  at  Kuling 
in  the  mountains  near  Kiukiang,  expecting  to 
return  to  Shanghai  for  the  month  of  August 
in  order  that  others  might  go  away.  It  was 
about  the  end  of  his  vacation  when  he  and 
three  friends,  Seabury,  Hume,  and  Gage,  who 
were  all  Yale  men  and  teaching  in  the  Yale 
school  at  Changsha,  China,  and  a  fourth 
friend,  Kemp,  who  was  teaching  at  Boone 
College,  Wuchang,  started  of¥  one  rainy  day 
for  a  tramp  to  an  ancient  Chinese  institution, 
''  The  White  Deer  College,"  founded  .in  the 
ninth  century,  about  ten  miles  from  Kuling. 
On  the  way  they  talked  about  books  and  the 
truth  they  were  all  seeking  to  serve,  and 
reached  the  college  about  noon.  Arthur 
Mann's  knowledge  of  Chinese  helped  to  open 
the  treasures  of  the  old  place,  and,  after  an 
interesting  visit,  they  started  home. 


Arthur  Mann  37 

On  the  way  home  they  decided  to  go  in 
swimming  in  a  pool  in  a  mountain  stream 
which  they  had  to  cross.  Above  this  pool  was 
another,  deeper  and  with  smooth,  rocky  walls 
about  it,  and  above  this  a  great,  flat  rock  over 
which  the  stream  dropped  in  a  cascade.  The 
road  ran  across  this  rock  beside  the  stream. 
The  rock  was  very  slippery  from  the  rain,  and 
Seabury,  who  could  not  swim  much  and  who 
evidently  purposed  simply  taking  a  bath  in  the 
stream  above  the  cascade,  lost  his  footing  on  it 
and  shot  over  the  cascade  into  the  deep  pool 
with  the  precipitous  sides.  Mann  at  once  went 
into  the  stream,  swollen  by  the  rain,  below  the 
pool  and  tried  to  swim  up  into  it  to  rescue 
Seabury.  At  last  he  succeeded,  but  only  to 
be  himself  carried  around  by  the  fierce  cur- 
rent and  drawn  under,  losing  his  own  life  in 
his  vain  effort  to  save  his  friend's. 

"  If  he  had  lived,"  said  Dr.  Pott,  "  he  would 
undoubtedly  have  become  one  of  the  most  in- 
fluential men  in  China.  All  who  were  asso- 
ciated with  him,  both  teachers  and  pupils  alike, 
felt  his  power,  and  will  cherish  the  memory  of 
his  example  as  one  of  their  most  priceless  pos- 
sessions. In  his  noble  act  of  sacrifice  in  the 
attempt  to  save  the  life  of  his  friend,  he  mani- 
fested that  he  had  entered  into  the  comprehen- 
sion of  the  love  that  is  stronger  than  death." 


Ill 

WARREN  BARTLETT  SEABURY 

WARREN  BARTLETT  SEABURY 
was  born  in  Lowell,  September  17, 
1877,  ^^  th^  fi^^h  generation  from 
Ivory  Hovey,  an  early  Christian  minister  in 
Massachusetts,  who  had  as  a  boy  a  strange 
adventure  with  a  robber  in  which,  without  ever 
stopping  to  consider  the  ethical  questions  in- 
volved, young  Ivory  came  off  ''  first  best." 
One   spring  morning,    as   the   story   is   told, 

"  about  the  year  1729,  a  boy,  then  in  his  early 
teens,  was  riding  horseback  from  Ipswich  to 
Topsfield,  Massachusetts,  carrying  nails  in  his 
saddlebags  for  use  in  building  his  father's  barn. 
Suddenly  he  was  confronted  by  a  highway- 
man who,  hearing  the  jingling  of  the  nails 
and  thinking  they  were  silver  dollars,  ordered 
him  to  halt.  The  quick  wit  of  this  country 
lad  caught  his  crafty  intent,  and  with  a  swift 
swing  of  his  right  arm  he  hurled  his  saddle- 
bags over  a  stone  wall,  nails  and  all.  The  rob- 
ber, instantly  dismounting,  sprang  for  his 
booty,  while  the  boy,  seeing  that  the  thief  had 

38 


Warren  Bartlett  Seabury  39 

a  better  horse  than  he,  mounted  the  fleeter 
animal  and  made  a  bold  dash  for  the  Topsfield 
farm.  The  sequel  of  this  exciting  adventure 
marks  a  crisis  in  his  life.  In  the  highwayman's 
saddlebags  this  boy,  Ivory  Hovey  by  name, 
found  a  goodly  sum  of  money,  with  which  he 
was  enabled  to  carry  out  a  long  cherished  am- 
bition for  an  education.  He  entered  Harvard 
College  in  1731,  graduating  with  honour  in 
1735,  a  college  mate  of  Samuel  Phillips,  father 
of  the  projector  and  principal  founder  of 
Phillips  Andover  Academy  and  ancestor  of 
Phillips  Brooks;  classmate  of  John  Phillips, 
founder  of  Phillips  Exeter  Academy." 

From  this  old  colonial  stock  Warren  Sea- 
bury  was  descended.  His  first  complete  sen- 
tence as  a  boy  was  '*  I  see,"  and  his  short  life 
was  a  life  of  seeing.  As  Mr.  Stokes,  the  sec- 
retary of  Yale  University,  said  at  the  Memo- 
rial Service  after  Warren's  death : 

"  Warren  Seabury  was  a  man  of  vision. 
When  a  youth  he  had  the  vision  to  see  that 
the  world  and  everybody  in  it  needed  the 
religion  of  Jesus  Christ.  He  had  the  vision  to 
realize  especially  what  Christianity  could  do 
for  China.  He  had  the  vision  to  see  a  small 
collegiate  school  developing  there  into  a  uni- 
versity, conducted  by  men  who  had  had  the 
experience  of  Yale  life  and  w^ork.  He  had  the 
vision  to  see  w^hat  such  an  institution  could 
do  in  the  building  up  of  China.    He  saw  how 


40        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

his  talents,  such  as  they  were,  could  be  sac- 
rificed to  that  service.  Warren  Seabury  left 
Yale  with  a  vision  which  was  doubtless  nur- 
tured early  in  the  home  life." 

While  Warren  was  still  a  boy  an  intelligent 
Chinese  who  was  accustomed  to  call  at  his 
home  in  Lowell  remarked  on  one  of  his  calls, 
"  Warren,  some  day  you  will  go  to  China  and 
teach  my  countrymen  about  Jesus  Christ." 

He  was  a  natural,  faithful  boy.  Like  many 
other  children  he  tried  his  hand  at  preaching 
and  one  Sabbath  gathered  his  family  together 
and  in  the  blessed  unself-consciousness  of 
childhood  gave  them  a  sermon  on  his  own 
account  on  the  text  "  God  is  love."  He  early 
showed  a  fondness  for  mechanics,  bought  a 
lathe  with  money  he  had  earned,  and  did  good 
work  on  it,  and  also  put  up  a  telephone  be- 
tween his  room  and  that  of  a  boy  friend.  His 
great  game  always  was  baseball.  He  spent  six 
years  at  the  Ames  Grammar  School.  Mr.  J. 
H.  Burdett,  the  principal,  writes : 

"  Warren  was  rather  reserved,  friendly  to 
all,  as  is  becoming  in  the  democracy  of  a  pub- 
lic school.  I  well  remember  his  uniform  bear- 
ing of  modest  self-respect  and  courtesy.  He 
was  instinctively  a  gentleman.  I  try  to  recall 
him  as  he  appeared  to  me  sixteen  years  ago, 
and  not  allow  my  picture  of  him  to  be  clouded 


Warren  Bartlett  Seabury  41 

by  my  knowledge  of  his  devotion  to  high  ideals 
and  Christian  heroism  so  conspicuous  in  his 
manhood." 

He  was  a  careful,  deliberate  boy  and  waited 
to  join  the  church  until  the  age  of  eighteen, 
when  he  had  settled  the  question  of  his  life 
work  too  and  had  resolved  to  be  a  minister. 
And  into  the  fulfilment  of  his  resolution  he  car- 
ried the  qualities  which,  as  an  original  boyish 
design  which  he  drew  to  express  his  loyalty  to 
his  mother  indicated,  were  the  moral  ideals 
he  revered.  On  the  right  of  the  design  was 
a  sword,  on  the  left  bow  and  arrow,  in  the 
centre  a  cross,  heavily  pencilled,  against  which 
stood  out  the  words  he  wished  her  especially 
to  mark :  "  Obedience.  Honour.  Chivalry. 
Love!' 

From  the  High  School  in  Dedham  Warren 
went  away  from  home  to  the  Hotchkiss  School 
at  Lakeville,  Connecticut,  then  under  the  head- 
mastership  of  Edward  G.  Coy,  the  former 
Greek  master  at  Phillips  Academy,  Andover, 
a  teacher  of  wonderful  ability  and  a  Christian 
personality  of  unusual  power  and  simplicity. 
An  accident  to  Warren's  knee  and  the  con- 
sequent disapproval  by  his  parents  of  his  par- 
ticipation in  rough  sport  kept  him  from  play- 
ing football,  but  baseball  he  deemed  the  finest 
of  all  games  and  revelled  in  it.    At  Hotchkiss 


42        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

his  religious  character  and  experience  unfolded 
in  earnest  naturalness.  He  referred  to  these 
things  seldom  in  his  home  letters,  but  he  did 
refer  to  them  in  just  the  ways  that  were  gen- 
uine and  right. 

"  I  have  been  thinking  of  my  own  Christian 
life,"  he  wrote.  ''  I  believe  it  will  strengthen 
my  faith  and  be  advantageous  to  me  in  every 
way  to  do  active  work  for  Christ.  I  have  a 
feeling  that  such  work  will  help  me  to  be  a 
better  Christian  and  to  come  into  sympathy 
with  Him.  I  must  make  my  college  life,  now 
so  near  at  hand,  doubly  profitable.,  once  for 
the  home  friends  and  once  for  myself." 

"  I  have  made  several  good  resolves  of  late,'* 
he  wrote  again,  "  but  I  think  it  is  better  not 
to  speak  of  them,  but  to  show  what  they  are 
by  their  results."  He  had  the  natural  dis- 
heartenings  and  questionings  of  all  honest 
souls. 

'*  I  am  almost  discouraged''  he  wrote,  "  and 
yet  I  cannot  explain  it.  I  feel  doubtful  about 
religion.  I  don't  know  what  to  do.  I  must 
remember  that  religion  is  not  emotion.  I  al- 
most feel  that  in  what  I  have  been  writing 
there  were  things  which  I  could  not  have  fully 
realized  or  things  in  which  I  was  deceived. 
Don't  mind  what  I  say.  I  shall  be  all  right 
soon.  At  any  rate  it  will  do  me  good  to  get 
home  once  more.     I  hope  to  get  into  college 


Warren  Bartlett  Seabury  43 

without  a  condition,  but  am  afraid  of  being 
over-confident." 

He  was  always  underestimating  his  own 
ability,  and  he  passed  all  his  examinations  for 
admission  to  Yale  without  conditions,  and  en- 
tered the  university  in  the  autumn  of  1896. 

For  two  years  the  handicap  of  his  injured 
knee  had  kept  him  from  athletics,  but  at  Yale 
he  was  able  to  come  back  to  the  track. 

"  I  have  been  running  nearly  all  the  fall," 
he  writes,  *'  in  preparation  for  the  autumn 
contests.  They  took  place  yesterday  and  I 
am  the  happy  possessor  of  two  shining  cups, 
one  for  second  in  the  one-hundred-yard  dash 
and  one  for  first  in  the  two-twenty.  It  was 
a  source  of  genuine  satisfaction  to  me,  but 
I  had  to  run  all  the  way.  As  a  result  I  was 
given  a  big  dinner  at  the  best  restaurant  in 
the  city." 

Writing  later  on  the  same  subject,  he  says : 

"  The  class  games  took  place  yesterday.  I 
was  not  successful.  It  is  a  sort  of  belief  of 
mine  that  there  is  a  law  of  compensation 
among  men;  that  if  one  cannot  excel  in  one 
direction,  he  can  in  another.  It  only  remains 
for  him  to  find  out  what  that  direction  is." 

Warren  was  not  prevented  from  finding 
what  the  direction  was  for  him.     Writing  of 


44        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

the  Sunday  services  in  Battell  Chapel  he  speaks 
of  deep  impressions  made  on  him,  and  adds, 
"  I  am  praying  for  guidance  and  the  soul  to 
follow  God  closely  in  my  life's  work/'  His 
life  at  Yale  fell  at  a  time  of  special  religious 
interest  in  the  university.  Special  evangelistic 
services  conducted  by  Mr.  Moody,  Dr.  George 
Adam  Smith,  and  Mr.  Mott  deeply  influenced 
the  university  and  at  the  same  time  a  tide  of 
missionary  interest  was  flowing  through  all 
the  classes.  As  a  result,  at  the  Northfield  Stu- 
dent Conference  in  the  summer  after  his 
Junior  year,  he  made  a  definite  decision,  and 
on  returning  home  "  he  beckoned  to  his  mother 
and  father  to  come  into  a  room  by  themselves, 
and  there  he  told  the  story  in  a  single  sentence : 
'  I  have  made  up  my  mind  to  be  a  mission- 
ary.' "  He  was  naturally  conservative  and 
cautious  and  he  would  not  act  hastily.  On 
returning  to  college  he  wrote: 

"  I  want  to  consider  with  you  the  question 
of  signing  the  Volunteer  Card.  H  I  decide  to 
sign,  I  want  to  do  it  before  I  graduate,  both 
for  my  own  good  and  for  the  good  of  those 
about  me.  This  is  my  last  year,  and  oh!  the 
thoughts  that  come  when  I  reflect  upon  that 
fact!  I  will  not  let  this  fire  go  out  if,  by 
God's  grace,  it  is  possible  to  keep  it  burning." 

And  again  a  little  later : 


Warren  Bartlett  Seabury  45 

"  During  this  Senior  year  I  am  trying  to 
live.  There  is  so  much  that  I  have  not  done, 
the  danger  is  I  will  not  do  it  in  this  my  last 
chance.  The  fact  is  I  don't  know  just  where 
to  begin." 

At  last,  after  long  consideration,  on  March 
I,  1900,  he  wrote: 

"  I  signed  the  Volunteer  Card  yesterday. 
You  know  this  is  no  sudden  decision  of  mine. 
I  have  been  thinking  of  it  for  a  long  time. 
Of  late  special  influence  has  been  brought  to 
bear  upon  me  through  my  friend,  Brewer 
Eddy,  and  others.  I  have  looked  at  the  matter 
from  every  side,  and  while  I  do  not  claim  to 
appreciate  this  step  fully,  I  feel  I  have  been 
divinely  guided  and  do  not  fear  self-accusation 
for  over-hastiness.  I  am  weak,  but  pray  for 
increasing  strength  every  day.         I.  II.  N." 

In  April  he  attended  the  Ecumenical  Mis- 
sionary Conference  in  New  York  City. 

"  I  am  glad  I  attended,"  he  wrote.  "  I  was 
impressed  with  the  fact  that  there  is  a  great 
host  of  missionaries  in  the  field;  that  the  mis- 
sionary enterprise  is  a  mighty  one,  supported 
by  the  best  element  in  the  churches;  that  the 
missionary's  calling  is  one  of  the  greatest  dig- 
nity, perhaps  the  nearest  fulfilment  of  Christ's 
will  on  earth.  One  remark  made  near  the  end 
of  the  meeting  is  well  worth  remembering: 
*  The  close  of  the  Ecumenical  Conference  is 


46        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

the  beginning  of  the  Ecumenical  conquest.' 
The  meetings  as  a  whole  were  a  great  inspira- 
tion. I  hope  now  to  go  on  from  strength 
to  strength,  without  the  interruption  caused 
by  lack  of  conviction,  hesitancy,  and  other 
petty  things  that  have  foolishly  hindered  my 
growth." 

And  a  little  later  he  wrote  of  how  the  whole 
matter  appeared  to  him: 

''  It  seems  to  me  that  if  God  is  at  one  end 
of  this  chain  of  fact,  the  need  of  man  is  at 
the  other,  and  if  I  can  be  one  to  fill  the  need, 
that  is  one  reason  for  my  going.  I  tried  to 
examine  every  foot  of  ground.  I  said,  '  If 
God  is  not  running  any  risk  in  this  course, 
I  am  running  none.'  Medicine  I  do  not  care 
for;  law  seems  less  and  less  attractive  as  time 
goes  on;  journalism  is  not  mine.  On  the 
ground  of  common  sens^  my  life  seems  to  be 
directed  towards  serving  Christ  actively.  If 
a  minister,  why  not  a  missionary  ?  So  you  see 
how  practically  I  have  gone  into  this  matter. 
I  do  not  feel  that  all  is  yet  done.  I  lack  deep 
faith,  confident  hope,  Christian  joy.  If  I  ever 
needed  your  prayers  it  is  now.  I  am  face  to 
face  with  the  future;  I  must  press  on." 

In  1900  he  pressed  on  from  Yale  into  his 
special  preparation  for  his  missionary  calling. 
But  the  testimony  of  his  roommate  shows  that 
he  had  been  already  preparing  for  it: 


Warren  Bartlett  Seabury  4^ 

"  As  a  friend  and  comrade  he  was  ideal, 
loyal  to  the  core,  and  dependable  under  all 
circumstances.  Roommates  for  three  years  as 
we  were,  I  do  not  recall  the  slightest  act  on 
his  part  which  was  unworthy  of  the  highest 
traditions  of  the  Christian  gentleman. 

"  As  a  student,  while  far  removed  from  the 
*  grind,'  Warren  was  careful,  painstaking,  and 
thoroughly  conscientious.  He  viewed  his  col- 
lege studies  as  a  preparation  for  usefulness 
in  his  after  life,  and  possessed  the  quality  of 
assimilating  knowledge  and  making  it  a  part 
of  himself.  It  was  natural  that  a  man  who 
threw  himself  with  his  whole  soul  into  as 
great  a  variety  of  activities  as  Warren  did, 
should  attain  a  genuine  popularity.  His  moral 
force  and  sound,  practical  wisdom  soon  made 
him  a  valued  counsellor  for  many  men  who 
prized  his  friendship. 

"  The  forcefulness  of  the  man  was  illus- 
trated in  the  way  he  announced  to  me  his 
decision  regarding  his  life's  work.  Although 
I  knew  he  was  deeply  interested  in  the  Student 
Volunteer  Movement,  I  had  no  idea  he  con- 
templated going  to  China  until  he  quietly  told 
me  one  evening  as  we  were  sitting  in  our 
room.  What  most  impressed  me  was  his  utter 
unselfishness.  The  only  matter  worthy  of  con- 
sideration appeared  to  him  to  be  where  his 
life  would  count  the  most  for  God  and  man. 

"Warren's  life  was  a  life  with  a  vision. 
During  his  college  course  those  near  him  per- 
ceived that  he  was  living  in  that  atmosphere 
of  souls  where  visions  may  be  seen. 


48        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

*' '  Who  shall  ascend  into  the  hill  of  the 
Lord;  or  who  shall  rise  up  in  His  holy  place? 
Even  he  that  hath  clean  hands  and  a  pure 
heart.'  " 

His  special  theological  preparation  for  his 
work  consisted  of  three  years  at  Hartford 
Theological  Seminary  and  an  added  year  of 
post-graduate  work  at  Yale,  studying  philos- 
ophy and  comparative  religion. 

"  From  the  time  he  crossed  the  threshold  of 
Hosmer  Hall/'  writes  one  of  the  professors 
at  Hartford,  "  he  was  a  power,  not  only  with 
his  classmates,  but  with  all  those  who  made 
up  the  common  fraternity  of  the  student  life. 
If  it  was  athletics  he  was  at  its  enthusiastic 
front;  if  it  was  the  social  life  he  was  its 
natural  gathering  point;  if  it  was  study  he 
gave  others  to  see  what  was  the  honest,  faith- 
ful spirit;  if  it  w^as  missions  he  stood  for  all 
the  work  of  an  interested  learner  and  a  de- 
voted doer  of  all  that  missions  offered  to  be 
done." 

And  President  Mackenzie  writes  of  him : 

"  He  stands  out  from  the  crowd  of  students 
whom  I  picture  as  I  recall  them,  for  the  sweet- 
ness and  strength  of  his  character.  He  seemed 
to  be  a  man  of  singularly  pure  mind,  of  deep 
earnestness,  of  quiet  dignity  in  his  bearing. 
While  his  Christian  zeal  was  apparent  to  every 
one,  it  was  combined  with  a  very  hearty  and 


Warren  Bartlett  Seabury  49 

happy  manner.  He  took  an  interest  in  the 
sports  of  his  fellows,  and  was  a  leader  in  their 
baseball  games.  He  looked  forward  to  his 
life-work  with  intense  delight,  prepared  for 
it  with  great  diligence,  entered  upon  it  with 
high  hopes.  We  must  trust  that  the  active 
life  so  soon  cut  short  here  was  called  away 
to  some  form  of  service  in  another  sphere." 

The  Seminary  offered  to  him  the  opportu- 
nity of  studying  methods  of  missionary  instruc- 
tion in  England,  Scotland,  and  Germany,  and, 
on  his  return,  of  lecturing  on  the  subject  be- 
fore the  students.  But  he  chose  to  return  to 
New  Haven  for  the  completion  of  his  prepa- 
ration to  go  out  to  the  foreign  field. 

Another  idea  also  was  working  in  his  mind. 
With  two  other  Yale  men  he  conceived  the 
idea  of  a  mission  of  the  university  in  some 
foreign  mission  field  to  be  manned  and  sup- 
ported by  Yale  men.  His  first  thought,  in 
consequence  of  having  just  read  "  Pilkington 
of  Uganda,"  was  of  Africa,  but  the  Boxer 
uprising  in  China  and  Pitkin's  martyr  death 
drew  the  thought  of  the  little  group  to  China. 
Seabury  himself  wrote  down  briefly  the  gen- 
esis of  the  idea: 

"  Under  the  inspiration  of  the  great  Ecu- 
menical Conference  in  New  York  in  the  spring 
of  1900,  the  original  project  regarding  a  Yale 


50        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

Foreign  Mission  became  articulate.  The  en- 
thusiasm for  missions  which  throbbed  in  those 
great  gatherings  in  Carnegie  Hall  did  not 
suppress  the  enthusiasm  which  we  as  Yale 
men  felt  for  our  own  college.  Surely  two 
such  mighty  forces  would  unite.  If  the  great 
burden  of  the  Church  were  missions,  if  the 
educated  and  enlightened  people  of  Christen- 
dom were,  under  God,  moving  in  invincible 
ranks  against  the  forces  of  evil,  surely  the 
college  of  our  choice  would  not  do  better  than 
add  its  strength  to  the  strong. 

'^  And  then  we,  who  were  planning  to  spend 
our  lives  in  foreign  service,  felt  that  we  could 
be  more  efficient  having  the  inspiration  of  men 
at  our  side,  not  only  stirred  by  the  same  great 
purpose,  but  with  the  interests  common  to 
young  men,  to  college  men,  yes,  to  Yale  men. 
It  was  our  conviction  that  our  lives  would 
be  stronger  with  the  Yale  spirit  on  the  field 
and  the  old  college  behind  us. 

"  This  was  all  very  well,  but  it  was  not  so 
easy  to  plan  the  details  of  support  and  man- 
agement. In  fact,  the  constitution,  as  it  now 
stands,  shows  but  slight  resemblance  to  its 
rude  forerunner  of  two  years  ago.  For  after 
repeated  consultations  two  or  three  of  us  were 
firmly  convinced  that  the  plan  was  practica- 
ble. The  back  room  at  the  Graduates'  Club 
witnessed  some  earnest  attempts  to  collect 
arguments,  arrange  them  in  logical  order,  and 
present  them  with  the  most  telling  effect  for 
our  expected  interviews  with  men  of  experi- 
ence.     Our    own    growing    confidence    was 


Warren  Bartlett  Seabury  51 

greatly  increased  by  talking  with  Mr.  Beach, 
Dr.  Barton,  Dr.  Capen,  Mr.  Stokes,  Mr.  Rob- 
erts, besides  many  in  closest  sympathy  with 
the  college  and  with  deepest  faith  in  her  sup- 
port. 

"  And  so,  as  wiser  heads  than  ours  have 
taken  the  plan  as  we  outlined  it  in  general 
and  have  developed  it,  as  we  could  not  have 
done,  we  are  content  to  stand  by  and  see  the 
college  we  love  take  a  hand  in  the  great  cause 
that  we  love  and  wait  until  we  are  wanted." 

The  university  welcomed  and  went  forward 
with  the  idea  in  characteristic  fashion,  with 
steadfastness,  careful  deliberation,  and  reso- 
lute action.  The  first  missionary  was  Law- 
rence Thurston,  appointed  June  6,  1902,  who 
spent  a  little  over  a  year  in  China,  and  was 
chiefly  instrumental  in  fixing  the  location  and 
character  of  the  Mission,  as  an  educational 
enterprise  at  Changsha.  Brownell  Gage,  now 
the  senior  member  of  the  Mission,  was  ap- 
pointed next,  and  Seabury  was  the  third  ap- 
pointee, on  November  3,  1902.  *'  From  the 
day  Warren  received  his  appointment,"  his 
father  writes,  "  he  gave  himself  to  the  busi- 
ness of  personal  preparation  for  his  work. 
First  came  the  further  discipline  of  his  mind 
in  philosophical  thinking,  in  ethics,  and  philol- 
ogy. He  made  no  specific  study  of  the  Chi- 
nese language,   believing  that   should  be  ac- 


52        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

quired  on  the  field  itself.  He  bent  his  energies 
to  the  fullest  understanding  of  China's  prob- 
lems, especially  her  problem  of  education. 
Henceforth  he  was  to  be  a  citizen  of  China, 
which  was  to  him  more  than  a  vast  aggrega- 
tion of  souls,  or  a  stupendous  geographical 
area  in  Eastern  Asia.  China  lived  in  him 
as  a  synonym  of  personal  reality  and  man- 
hood." 

He  left  home  in  September,  1904.  "  It  is 
somewhat  hard  to  say  *  good-bye,'  "  he  wrote 
to  a  member  of  the  Yale  Committee,  "  but  a 
man  must  play  the  game,  and  I  expect  the 
best  of  good  things  for  all  those  who  do  their 
duty  as  they  see  it."  And  he  left  home  with 
no  complaints  or  lamentations  but  with  good 
cheer.  Two  days  after  leaving,  on  his  twenty- 
seventh  birthday,  he  wrote  home,  ''  All's  well 
and  I  am  happy!     Too  beautiful  to  be  sad!" 

At  Shanghai  Warren  visited  St.  John's  Col- 
lege and  met  Arthur  Mann,  who  three  years 
later  was  to  die  with  him  and  for  him, 
and  then  went  on  up  the  Yangtse  River  to 
Hankow,  where  he  spent  the  winter  at  work 
on  the  language.  It  was  hard  work.  He 
wrote  to  Professor  Reed : 

"  It  sometimes  becomes  tiring  to  grub  away 
at  this  interminable  language,  but  I  am  glad 
you  expect  so  much  of  us.     It  will  keep  us 


Warren  Bartlett  Seabury  53 

hard  at  work  in  the  recognition  of  the  work 
we  are  bound  to  do.  It  is  patience  which 
we  need  in  the  acquisition  of  this  reasonless, 
armless,  footless,  bottomless,  endless  language. 
One  can't  do  much  of  anything  out  here  in 
a  hurry  (unless  it  be  to  get  sick)  and  first  in 
the  list  of  these  impossibilities  stands  the 
language.  We  arc  hard  at  work  and  will 
remain  as  hard  at  it  as  we  can  consistently 
with  the  demands  of  health  and  efficiency." 

In  one  of  his  letters  home  he  humorously 
writes : 

"  Yesterday,  after  six  hours'  work  on  the 
language,  I  felt  as  if  I  never  wanted  to  see 
another  Chinese  character.  They  all  seemed 
like  so  many  chocolate  creams  left  out  in  the 
rain." 

In  February,  1905,  Warren  moved  to 
Changsha,  the  capital  of  the  province  of 
Hunan,  and  a  city  of  192,000  people.  After 
getting  settled  the  great  concern  of  the  mis- 
sionaries was  to  find  an  adequate  and  per- 
manent site  for  the  Mission,  which  had  been 
invited  by  all  the  denominational  societies  in 
the  province  to  do  the  higher  educational  work 
for  all  the  missions.  Meanwhile  he  accepted 
an  invitation  to  teach  English  in  a  large  na- 
tive school  of  the  Changsha  Board  of  Educa- 
tion.    It  was  a  good  way  to  acquire  influence 


54        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

and  make  friends,  and  it  had  its  amusing  com- 
pensations, as  these  essays  by  his  pupils  will 
indicate. 

"  WALE  " 

"  The  wale  is  the  larger  kind  of  the  fish 
and  his  power  is  so  highter  that  all  the  fish 
live  in  water  are  controled  by  him.  But  he 
difference  all  the  fish  for  he  no  gills  or  fins 
for  it  is  hard  when  he  turns  in  the  water  and 
in  a  few  very  minutes  he  cannot  appears  in 
the  air  that  he  might  died.  As  for  his  spout 
can  he  wrecks  the  smaller  vessels  and  the  fish- 
ing smacks,  the  people  of  the  river's  bank  al- 
most always  distressed  by  him." 

"  WHALE  " 

"  Some  animals  in  water  are  lived  chiefly 
by  the  fish.  The  different  kinds  of  fish  are 
very  much.  As  the  whale  is  especially  with 
other.  If  we  catch  a  fish  to  lay  down  at  the 
ground  it  will  not  take  long  that  which  is  soon 
to  die.  Why?  Because  all  fish  cannot  live 
on  land  to  inspire  the  air.  But  the  whale  can 
be  inspiring  the  air  and  drinking  the  water 
also.  He  often  inspires  the  air  going  down 
to  the  bottom  of  water  by  and  by  rise  up 
aginst  to  spit  the  air  so  high  that  almost  thirty 
feet  away.  He  has  no  gil  but  has  a  large 
mouse.  When  our  traveled  ship  must  take 
care  and  don't  sail  into  his  mouse.  Thus  the 
whale  is  a  king  of  fish." 


Warren  Bartlett  Seabury  55 

He  took  advantage  of  opportunities,  also, 
to  make  the  acquaintance  of  the  governor,  and 
in  due  time  the  Yale  Mission  College  v^as 
begun  in  rented  property.  Many  problems 
beset  the  opening  of  the  school,  but  these  were 
faced  with  clear  discernment  and  unbending 
principle  by  Gage  and  Seabury  and  the  asso- 
ciates who  soon  joined  them.  Warren  was 
resolved  also  to  develop  athletic  life  among 
the  students,  to  teach  them  American  games, 
and  to  fulfil  a  humorous  prediction  which  he 
had  made  to  a  Hartford  professor:  "I  shall 
coach  the  Chinese  boys  in  athletics,  then  I 
shall  become  a  Cochin  (coach  in)  China." 

In  the  spring  of  1906  Changsha  was  devas- 
tated by  a  disastrous  flood  and  Warren  was 
busy  in  generous  service  of  the  community  in 
its  needs.  This  made  more  friends  for  the 
Mission,  but  it  was  still  unable  to  get  land 
of  its  own.  He  wrote  of  this  to  his 
mother : 

"  I  am  very  anxious  that  you  should  not 
think  of  me  as  experiencing  things  that  would 
cause  you  pain.  There  are  times  when  I  think 
of  you  with  more  than  usual  tenderness,  but 
even  the  good  letters  and  gifts  from  you  do 
not  bring  about  unhappy  collapses.  You  must 
think  of  me  as  well  and  strong,  contented, 
and  satisfied  with  this  work.     It  would  not 


56        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

be  a  good  thing  if  our  paths  were  all  smooth. 
We  have  been  very  much  tried  by  our 
failure  to  get  land.  It  may  be  well  for  us 
if  our  hardest  trials  come  at  the  first,  so  long 
as  we  weather  them  and  find  ourselves  better 
for  the  storms.  We  rebel  in  word  as  we 
talk  of  it  and  the  matter  is  often  in  our  silent 
thoughts  and  we  find  it  hard  to  see  why  we 
should  be  blocked,  when  every  consideration 
seems  to  lay  upon  us  the  greatest  haste.  It 
must  be  for  the  best,  if  one  must  suffer,  to 
suffer  with  others  and  in  their  interests.  May 
we  come  out  refined  by  the  fire  and  welded 
into  a  mission  of  men  and  women  who  will 
remain  inseparable  to  the  last." 

His  two  first  summers  in  China  in  spite 
of  the  heat  were  spent  in  Changsha,  but  the 
summer  of  1907  he  was  prevailed  upon  to 
go  to  Kuling,  where  the  missionaries  from 
the  Yangtse  Valley  gather  for  rest  and  con- 
ference in  the  hot  and  unhealthful  days,  and 
where  Warren  had  been  for  ten  days  in  May 
of  the  preceding  year  in  consultation  over  the 
plans  of  the  Mission.  He  spent  thirteen  days 
in  Kuling  and  then  on  July  29th  went  with 
a  little  company  of  friends  on  the  visit  to  the 
ancient  Chinese  College  in  the  mountains  near 
Kuling  from  which  he  and  Arthur  Mann,  as 
we  have  read  in  the  sketch  of  Arthur  Mann's 
life,  never  returned. 


Warren  Bartlett  Seabury  57 

"  They   two   went  down  the  hills  through  a 

stormy  dawn 
With  joyous  comrades,  laughing  in  the  mist, 
Cleaving  the  windy  fog  before  their  steps, 
And  holding  converse  as  they  downward  fared. 


"  The  storm  fog  drenched  their  footing  on  the 

stones, 
The  rains  came  roaring  down  the  mountain 

streams, 
The  torrent  snatched  them, — and  they  were 

no  more. 

"  Their  souls  walked  forth  across  the  morning 

heights, 
And  past  the  peaks  and  up  beyond  the  clouds; 
So,  while  their  brethren  sought  their  bodies 

drowned, 
That  loving  hands  might  tomb  them  in  the 

hills, 
Christ  met  them  all  amazed — in  Paradise." 

It  was  a  clean,  competent,  well-rounded  life 
that  the  torrent  carried  ofif  from  the  service 
of  China  and  the  world,  a  man  made  ready 
for  God's  use  here  on  earth  and  ready  there- 
fore for  some  great  and  urgent  need  which 
demanded  him  in  the  Kingdom  of  his  Father. 
Mr.  Gage,  who  had  known  him  for  many 
years,  bore  testimony  to  his  full  equipment 
for  his  work: 


58        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

"  I  should  name  as  most  prominent  and  im- 
portant these  characteristics  in  Warren  which 
are  essential  to  success:  i.  Robust  health  and 
absence  of  *  nerves.'  2.  Cheerfulness  and  a 
keen  sense  of  humour.  3.  Patience  and  per- 
fect good  nature  with  exasperating  people  and 
circumstances.  4.  Enthusiasm,  earnestness, 
and  force  of  character.  5.  Entire  freedom 
from  gossip  and  the  tendency  to  talk  over 
the  weaknesses  of  others.  6.  Good  sense  and 
willingness  to  learn,  to  change  his  mind  and 
to  take  advice  and  receive  suggestions,  al- 
though they  might  oppose  his  previous  views." 

But  best  and  most  of  all,  he  lived  in  the 
Eternal  Life.  As  he  wrote  in  1906  to  one 
of  his  intimate  friends,  "  I  do  not  know  what 
is  before  me,  but  I  am  *  building  my  nest  in 
the  greatness  of  God.'  " 

"  In  the  greatness  of  God."  This  is  the 
spring  of  heroism  and  fidelity.  Here  Mann 
and  Seabury  found  it.  And  there  now  they 
are  found. 


IV 

JOHN  LAWRENCE  THURSTON 

JOHN  LAWRENCE  THURSTON  was 
born  at  Whitinsville,  Massachusetts,  on 
August  4,  1874,  and  Whitinsville  was 
home  to  him  until  he  went  out  to  find  a  new 
home  in  China.  He  came  of  an  old  line  of 
New  England  ancestors  who  had  dwelt  in 
Massachusetts  and  Maine  for  nearly  two  hun- 
dred and  fifty  years,  and  he  lived  up  to  the 
family  character  and  to  the  full  meaning  of 
the  family  name  of  Thurston,  "  God's  rock  " 
or  "  God's  servant." 

Lawrence  had  a  severe  illness  as  a  child 
which  left  its  effects  upon  him  for  years  and 
kept  him  at  home  as  a  small  boy,  but  when 
he  grew  older  and  went  to  school,  as  his  mother 
says : 

"  It  was  found  that  he  picked  up  more 
*  slang '  in  a  week  than  his  elder  brother  had 
in  two  years,  and  his  friends  of  later  years 
will  remember  his  fondness  for  what  we  might 
call  picturesque  language.     But  his  conscience 

59 


6o        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

was  alert,  and  he  never  strayed,  I  think,  into 
profanity." 

He  had  a  good,  wholesome  American  boy- 
hood. 

"  I  remember  my  jig-saw  Christmas,"  he 
wrote  years  afterwards.  ''  If  I  remember  cor- 
rectly, I  didn't  do  anything  but  saw  all  day,  and 
oh,  the  woe  that  filled  my  soul  when,  within  a 
day  or  two,  I  screwed  it  up  too  tight  and 
broke  off  a  great  piece  and  wrecked  it.  .  .  . 
Do  you  remember  when  I  came  home  with  my 
third  tin  drum  from  the  Sunday-school  tree? 
/  do  anyway.  And  I  never  can  feel  that  those 
Christmas  delights  are  past  even  though  I  am 
no  longer  a  child." 

His  happiest  memories  clustered  around  the 
old  barn  loft  and  the  home  pond. 

At  the  age  of  fifteen  he  went  away  to 
Worcester  Academy. 

*'  His  diary  for  the  first  year  records  the 
result  of  every  baseball  or  football  game,  with 
ample  justification  for  the  team  in  defeat  and 
a  corresponding  joy  in  victory.  Writing  home 
to  the  family  on  the  occasion  of  a  notable  vic- 
tory, he  had  happened  to  describe  with  much 
detail  a  banquet  which  the  whole  school  had 
attended.  *  I  don't  know  but  what  you  will 
think,'  he  concluded,  '  that  I  cared  more  for 
the  supper  than  for  the  game,  but  I  didn't.'  " 


John  Lawrence  Thurston  6i' 

He  made  one  noble  effort  in  athletics,  as 
his  diary  indicates,  but  it  ended  in  disaster  and 
he  made  no  more : 

"  May  6.  I  began  to  train  for  walking  (the 
mile  walk)  this  afternoon. 

'  May  II.     Went  to  gym  to  see  about  training. 

'  May  12.  Trained.  I  walked  as  far  as  the 
ruins  of  the  house. 

'  May  19.  We  trained.  The  cinder  track  is 
being  laid. 

'  May  20.  We  trained.  The  track  was  laid 
to-day. 

*  May  21.  We  trained  for  the  last  time  be- 
fore the  sports. 

'  May  22.  I  got  my  gym  clothes  and  put 
them  in  a  bag  for  the  races. 

'  May  23.  (The  day  of  the  games.)  Wil- 
liams walked  the  mile  in  eight 
minutes,  twenty  seconds.  I 
walked  and  had  150  yards 
handicap  and  came  in  150  yards 
behind." 

He  met  with  more  success  as  a  Nature  stu- 
dent in  the  Agassiz  Association,  which  he 
helped  to  found.  Here  is  one  of  his  letters 
to  his  sister  about  it: 

"  We  took  our  walk  Monday  and  were  out 
about  three  hours.  We  all  had  a  perfectly 
delightful  time.  We  found  fully  thirty  flowers 
in  bloom.  Rob  Smith  kept  the  list.  I  found 
one  new  flower,  the  dwarf  ginseng  or  ground 


62        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

nut.  I  see  that  you  found  it  at  Norton,  but 
we  haven't  pressed  it  before.  Rob  brought 
home  for  the  society  meeting  a  black,  poison- 
ous water-snake,  but  we  put  him  in  a  tin  box 
so  that  he  is  perfectly  safe,  and  a  little  puff 
adder  about  a  foot  long.  We  think  we  shall 
put  both  in  alcohol.  We  found  several  com- 
mon lizards  and  one  black  one  with  yellow 
spots.     I  have  forgotten  his  name." 

He  was  not  a  great  student  and  was  well 
aware  of  it.  His  first  year  in  the  academy 
he  stood  high,  as  he  said,  because  his  brother 
had  stood  high  and  he  was  not  yet  found  out. 
But  he  had  trouble  in  his  entrance  examina- 
tions for  Yale  and  decided  to  go  back  and  take 
an  extra  year  at  the  academy  in  order  to  enter 
without  conditions.  During  this  extra  year 
he  debated  with  himself  the  claims  of  the 
different  professions.  In  one  letter  he  names 
and  discusses  them,  closing,  "  Don't  think  I 
have  mentioned  these  in  any  order,  for  I  have 
put  them  down  as  they  have  come  to  me. 
What  an  opportunity  a  young  man  does  have 
and  how  short  a  time  there  is  to  grasp  it 
in !  "  A  few  weeks  later  he  wrote  home,  still 
unaware  of  what  he  was  ultimately  to  decide 
to  do: 

"  This    evening    Mr.    Davis    presented    the 
Chinese. side  of  the  Geary  outrage.     I  never 


John  Lawrence  Thurston  63, 

reahzed  before  what  a  future  there  was  before 
China.  You  know  our  great  diplomatist  be- 
heves  that  the  Chinese  are  to  be  to  America 
what  the  Goths  and  Huns  were  to  Rome. 
Whether  we  believe  it  or  not  there  is  some- 
thing to  think  about  in  it." 

While  he  was  at  Worcester  he  united  with 
the  church.  In  many  ways  he  began  to  look 
at  the  serious  purpose  of  life,  and  before  he 
left  the  academy  he  had  decided  to  study  for 
the  Christian  ministry.  That  was  just  the 
natural  outcome  of  his  true  devotion  and  high 
ideals.  How  clean  and  high  his  ideals  were 
is  shown  in  a  letter  written  home  after  some 
disclosures  of  school  dishonesty : 

"  It  has  been  quite  lively  here  this  week  in 
more  ways  than  one.  First,  three  boys  have 
been  expelled  or  suspended.  .  .  .  They  all 
desen^ed  it  and  there  are  more  like  them.  Fri- 
day Mr.  A talked  to  us  about  the  whole 

matter  after  chapel.  The  root  of  the  evil  is 
dishonesty,  the  very  thing  that  I  spoke  of  while 
at  home.  Lying  and  cheating  are  so  easy  for 
schoolboys  to  fall  into.  They  don't  do  it 
intentionally,  but  gradually  their  consciences 
become  blunted  and  before  they  know  it  a  lie 
is  as  easy  as  a  crib  on  the  Xenophon  margin 
was  before.  When  you  see  class  leaders  in 
scholarship,  school  leaders  in  athletics  stoop- 
ing to  little  meannesses  to  gain  a  point  or  two 


64        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

on  the  teacher's  book,  or  in  the  estimation  of 
their  fellows,  it  makes  you  sick  at  heart.  A 
high  sense  of  honour,  a  very  sensitive  con- 
science are  rare  qualities.  I  wouldn't  imply 
that  there  aren't  many  good  fellows,  but  their 
standards  are  not  high  enough.  Their  ideals 
are  either  of  a  low  order  or  are  lacking  al- 
together." 

But  he  was  full  of  gay  spirits  and  playful- 
ness, as  the  Class  Historian  pointed  out  at  the 
Academy  Commencement  in  June,  1893 : 

"  Then  there  is  John  L.  Thurston,"  the  his- 
tory reads,  "  a  man  with  a  perfectly  rabid 
affection  for  Yale.  With  Mr.  S (a  Har- 
vard man)  he  wrangles  frequently  on  the  sub- 
ject and  is  often  successful.  He  is  the  only 
man  in  the  class  that  claims  to  grind  and  this 
he  does  incessantly.  He  has  without  doubt 
the  most  copious  vocabulary  of  slang  that  has 
ever  been  put  in  constant  use.  For  this  reason 
Societies  for  Prevention  of  Slang  have  been 
frequently  organized  for  his  benefit  but  with 
indifferent  success." 

In  Yale  he  set  himself  to  do  clean  solid 
work.  He  knew  his  limitations  and  he  was 
free  from  illusions.  But  every  year,  as  he  bent 
himself  diligently  to  his  duties,  his  power  grew 
and  he  went  steadily  upward  in  his  standing 
in  his  class.     And  he  was  equally  steady  and 


John  Lawrence  Thurston  65 

ongoing  in  his  Christian  work  and  character. 
The  great  decision  to  be  a  missionary  came 
in  his  first  year,  and  in  one  of  his  home 
letters  he  tells  about  it.  Various  influences 
operated  on  him,  and : 

*'  When  I  came  home  at  night,"  he  says  of 
the  eventful  day,  "  I  prayed  as  I  never  had 
before.  It  was  a  fearful  struggle  and  I  slept 
undecided.  I  thought  I  was  willing  to  go 
anywhere,  but  when  it  came  to  setting  my  face 
steadfastly  towards  the  foreign  field,  it  seemed 
a  different  thing.  The  next  morning  I  prayed 
and  it  was  decided.  It  was  all  over  and  only 
once  or  twice  did  a  thought  come  of  looking 
back." 

This  missionary  purpose  dominated  all  the 
rest  of  his  college  career.  He  deliberately 
concentrated  his  efforts  on  his  Christian  and 
missionary  ideals.  But  his  Christian  single- 
mindedness  and  consecration  did  not  make 
him  gloomy  or  unhappy.  "  He  was  one  of  the 
most  consistent  Christians  in  '98,"  writes  one 
of  his  classmates.  "  Perhaps  he  was  narrow," 
says  another,  "  but  he  was  very  lovable  in  his 
narrowness." 

"  He  combined  to  an  unusual  degree,''  is 
the  word  of  another,  "  the  art  of  *  having  a 
good  time  '  with  the  science  of  '  being  good.' 


66        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

He  was  always  merry,  yet  he  ne^Tr  had  to 
call  for  pipe,  bowl,  or  fiddlers  to  make  him 
so.  Although  he  had  a  sterner  code  of  ethics 
than  his  classmates,  none  of  them  ever  en- 
joyed life  more  thoroughly  than  he  did. 
Willing  to  spend  four  hours  over  freshman 
Greek  when  necessary,  he  was  just  as  willing 
to  spend  long  hours  preparing  for  our  '  fresh- 
man fun '  at  the  Glee  Club  '  Prom.'  Concert. 
I  never  knew  any  one  more  truly  reverent, 
yet  his  piety  was  never  marred  by  any  undue 
solemnity.  With  an  ability  to  be  tremendously 
earnest  there  went  at  the  same  time  a  keen 
sense  of  humour,  which  kept  him  out  of  the 
pitfall  of  taking  himself  too  seriously.  He 
always  seemed  to  appreciate  the  other  man's 
point  of  view.  ...  It  was  this  unique  com- 
bination of  qualities  that  made  him  so  lovable, 
that  made  him  for  me  the  true  Christian,  full 
of  faith  and  full  of  fun,  always  fired  with  re- 
ligious devotion,  yet  never  without  that  sweet 
reasonableness  which  was  his  peculiar  charm." 

In  his  habits  and  personal  principles  he  was 
as  clean  as  he  was  in  his  great  missionary 
devotion. 

"  Times  without  number,"  writes  a  fellow- 
student,  "  we  have  discussed  the  questions  that 
come  before  college  men  for  decision,  and  I 
always  used  to  insist  with  him  that  he  drew 
lines  of  duty  and  principle  too  fine. 

"  He   had   never   smoked   in  college.     He 


John  Lawrence  Thurston  d^j 

could  see  the  good  in  a  man  who  did,  and 
never  was  wilHng  to  condemn  a  man  harshly 
because  he  chose  to  be  broader  than  Laurie 
thought  right;  but  for  himself  and  his  own 
life  smoking  was  wrong.  Once  having  decided 
it  there  was  no  moving  him.  I  remember  one 
instance  in  particular.  It  came  to  the  time  of 
the  class  histories  on  the  campus  at  the  close 
of  his  college  course  and  the  class  pipe  w^ent 
the  rounds,  but  despite  the  pleadings  of  the 
committee  he  was  unwilling  to  break  what  was 
to  him  a  vital  principle,  even  on  such  a  justifia- 
ble occasion.  He  spoke  about  it  afterwards 
with  great  regret,  wishing  that  he  might  have 
avoided  so  open  a  break  with  the  men  who 
had  urged  it  upon  him;  but  he  was  sure  in  his 
own  mind  that  he  ought  not  to  yield,  and  that 
settled  the  question  for  all  time.  He  was  nar- 
row in  the  popular,  careless  sense  of  the  word, 
and  was  so  considered  by  many  men  in  the 
class  and  even  by  his  friends.  But  it  seems 
to  me  as  those  incidents  sweep  before  the 
memory  that  it  was  the  narrowness  of  con- 
centration and  not  of  ignorance  or  of  bigotry. 
His  life  had  a  fixed  amount  of  energy  to  be 
invested,  and  he  knew  he  must  not  spread  it 
out  too  thin  over  unessential  things.  He  used 
to  bring  the  matter  up  in  those  talks  in  the 
winter  evenings  after  the  day's  work  was  done 
or  we  had  returned  from  some  meeting,  and 
always  his  breadth  of  view  was  in  contrast  to 
the  concentration  of  his  activity.  He  recog- 
nized the  good  in  the  time  spent  in  all  athletics, 
or  at  the  fence  making  friendships  that  were 


68        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

to  last  for  life,  but  he  definitely  gave  up  some 
of  those  pleasantest  elements  of  college  life 
for  the  larger  gain  of  character  and  usefulness. 
I  would  not  commend  his  limitations  any  more 
than  he  would  himself  if  he  were  writing  this: 
but  I  do  praise  the  consecration  and  courage 
of  a  man  that  could  clearly  follow  a  path 
that  he  had  marked  out  in  spite  of  criticism 
or  of  the  pleadings  of  his  friends.  Strength 
was  the  cry  of  his  ambition  and  not  popularity 
or  attractiveness.  To  do,  as  well  as  was  pos- 
sible for  him,  the  things  to  which  he  com- 
mitted his  effort,  was  the  quest  of  those  years." 

After  he  left  college  he  and  four  other  Yale 
men  did  a  great  work  for  a  year  among  the 
young  people  of  the  country,  travelling  about 
as  *'  The  Yale  Missionary  Band."  From  Port- 
land, Maine,  to  Milwaukee,  they  visited  the  im- 
portant centres,  addressing  about  900  meet- 
ings with  nearly  200,000  people  in  95  cities, 
and  reached  between  two  and  three  thousand 
young  people's  societies  in  364  conferences.  It 
was  a  remarkable  service  for  five  lads,  for  they 
were  little  more,  and  it  made  a  deep  and  en- 
during impression  upon  the  Christian  Church 
in  America. 

With  the  splendid  fruitage  and  experience 
of  this  year,  Lawrence  went  on  into  the 
Auburn  and  Hartford  Theological  Seminaries. 
In  both  seminaries  he  was  the  same  unselfish, 


John  Lawrence  Thurston  69 

pure-hearted,  unconventional,  clean-principled 
man  he  had  been  in  college,  doing  his  work 
loyally  but  with  all  his  interest  in  the  practical 
and  living  things. 

'*  My  mind  is  full  of  Biblical  criticism,"  he 
wrote,  "  and  evolution  and  Negroes.  I'd 
rather  have  it  full  of  Negroes  alone.  I'd  rather 
put  it  on  the  practical,  the  real,  and  the  evi- 
dently necessary.  I  wonder  if  it  is  wrong  to 
be  practical.  These  other  questions  are  inter- 
esting and  important,  but  I  get  so  tired  of 
them  and  they  seem  so  little  related  to  the 
great  needs  of  the  day.  For  so  many  to  spend 
so  much  time  on  them  seems  almost  like  a 
waste  of  human  energy." 

His  summer  vacation  was  not  complete  with- 
out a  time  of  camping  out  on  Johnny's  Island 
in  the  pond  at  Whitinsville.  For  twelve  suc- 
cessive summers  the  camp  was  maintained. 
Larry  saw^  the  beginning  and  the  end  of  it. 
It  was  a  real  boys'  camp,  with  Larry  as  the 
life  of  it,  and  it  had  a  grand  ending  in  the 
summer  of  1902  before  he  sailed  for  China 
to  be  one  of  the  pioneers  of  the  Yale  Mission, 
in  whose  founding  he  was  one  of  the  prime 
movers.  On  September  29,  1902,  he  started 
with  his  wife,  w^ho  had  been  Miss  Calder  of 
Mount  Holyoke  College.  On  reaching  China 
he  went  first  to  Peking,  as  everythino^  was  still 


yo        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

to  be  decided  with  reference  to  the  Mission. 
His  first  work  was  on  the  language,  and  at 
it  he  went  with  the  same  pertinacity  which 
he  had  shown  in  college  and  seminary.  From 
Peking  he  visited  Shan-si  province  as  a  pos- 
sible field  for  the  Mission,  but  reported  advising 
against  it,  urging  that  the  Mission  should  be 
an  educational  mission,  and  suggesting  Chang- 
sha,  in  the  Province  of  Hunan,  as  the  proper 
location. 

But  Lawrence  was  not  to  have  a  part  in 
laying  the  foundations  at  Changsha,  which 
was  soon  definitely  selected  as  the  centre  of 
the  Mission.  He  went  to  Kuling  in  the  Yang- 
tse  Valley  for  the  summer  of  1903  in  order 
that  he  might  confer  with  the  missionaries 
from  Hunan  and  central  China,  and  there  to 
his  amazement  it  was  found  that  he  had  tuber- 
culosis, and  toward  the  end  of  the  summer  he 
was  ordered  home.  He  reached  San  Fran- 
cisco on  December  4th,  and  hoped,  through  a 
stay  in  California  and  careful  attention  to  the 
doctor's  orders,  to  regain  his  health  and  return 
to  China ;  but  it  was  not  to  be,  and  on  May  loth 
he  heard  the  call  that  was  to  take  him  on  from 
China  and  California  to  a  better  country,  even 
a  heavenly. 

But  his  work  did  not  end.  The  testimony 
of  one  friend  might  be  duplicated  by  the  tes- 


John  Lawrence  Thurston  71 

tiniony  of  many,  for  no  such  life  as  Lawrence 
Thurston's  can  be  stopped : 

"  Sweet  memories  they  are,  as  they  rise  be- 
fore me — those  recollections  of  Laurie;  the 
long  years  in  Yale  on  the  top  floor  of  Law- 
rence Hall;  the  journeys  in  the  West  in  the 
intense  days  of  our  life,  learning  some  of  the 
deepest  spiritual  lessons  that  could  come  to  a 
young  man;  those  many  times  on  the  island 
when  relaxation  was  justified  and  enjoyed; 
that  wonderful  year  at  Auburn  when  the 
broader  thoughts  of  modern  study  gripped  us 
both  and  we  felt  a  cautious  way  into  a  position 
that  should  combine  the  strongest  elements  of 
both  the  old  and  the  new.  They  are  a  precious 
and  permanent  memorial  of  as  true  a  friend, 
as  strong  and  courageous  and  useful  a  man 
as  I  will  ever  know.  His  death  only  increases 
the  power  he  had  over  my  life.  For  in  the 
college  days  his  was  one  of  the  strongest 
formative  influences  that  came  to  me.  And 
now  that  he  has  so  soon  finished  his  work 
here,  I  find  the  example  of  the  dear  friend 
still  as  potent  for  good  as  ever  it  was  when 
we  lived  together." 


HENRY  DICKINSON  SMITH 

NO  writer  on  China  is  better  known  than 
Dr.  Arthur  Smith,  since  1872  a  mis- 
sionary of  the  American  Board  to  the 
Chinese  people.  His  alert  mind,  nimble  wit, 
unceasing  energy,  and  deep  faith  in  God's 
great  purpose  for  the  Chinese  nation  have 
made  him  one  of  the  best  known  missionaries 
and  most  widely  loved  friends  of  China. 
Henry  Dickinson  Smith  was  Dr.  Smith's  only 
son,  a  son  after  his  father's  own  mind  and 
heart,  and  a  lad  of  such  self-forgetfulness,  and 
of  such  faithfulness  to  duty  and  to  oppor- 
tunity as  won  for  him  the  crown  which  be- 
longs to  those  who  give  up  their  lives  for 
others. 

Henry  was  born  in  Tientsin,  China,  January 
2.2,  1861.  The  ordinary  ways  of  childhood 
were  marked  in  his  case  with  a  special  dis- 
tinction of  mental  originality  and  cleverness, 
but  without  any  folly  or  self-conceit.  Native 
good  sense  and  wise  home  training  balanced 

the  boy's  keen  capacity  and  kept  him  natural 

72 


Henry  Dickinson  Smith  73 

and  true.  At  the  age  of  fourteen  he  was  left 
in  America  for  his  education  while  his  par- 
ents returned  to  China.  In  the  Oakland  High 
School,  where  he  began  his  home  studies,  he 
at  once  attracted  attention  by  his  quick  intel- 
ligence and  energetic  enthusiasm,  so  that  his 
schoolmates  dubbed  him  "  Freak  Smith." 

In  vacation  times  he  was  not  idle.  He  al- 
ways had  some  work  on  hand.  He  began  by 
doing  errands.  Passing  a  house,  a  w^oman 
who  was  a  stranger  called  to  him.  She  was 
alone  with  a  sick  baby.  Would  he  be  willing 
to  go  to  the  drug  store  for  medicine? 
''  Mother,"  he  wrote,  ''  she  just  chucked  her 
w^hole  pocketbook  into  my  hand.  I  made 
change  all  right,  and  brought  it  back  to  her  at 
once.  When  she  tried  to  pay  me  I  wouldn't 
take  it,  for  you  know  I  promised  God  if  He'd 
give  me  a  bicycle,  I'd  do  errands  for  Him." 
This  was  illustrative  of  the  boy's  spirit.  At 
another  time  he  worked  during  the  long  hot 
days  in  a  cannery  and  again  as  an  elevator 
boy. 

When  the  high-school  course  was  completed 
he  decided  to  go  into  business,  at  least  until 
he  could  decide  deliberately  as  to  a  college 
course,  and  for  a  year,  and  with  great  success, 
he  worked  in  a  San  Francisco  store.  The 
energies  and  activities  of  his  position  suited 


74        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

him,  and  the  temptation  was  strong  to  forego 
a  college  training  and  go  on  in  business,  where 
attractive  offers  were  made  to  him.  In  the 
end,  and  with  his  father's  earnest  counsel,  he 
decided  for  college  and  entered  Beloit  College, 
Wisconsin,  in  the  fall  of  1898. 

His  freshman  year  was  the  least  satisfactory 
of  his  course.  Some  careless  ways  of  his 
business  life  were  to  be  outgrown,  and  his 
mind  had  to  pass  through  a  time  of  unrest- 
fulness  before  it  settled  down  for  itself  and 
clearly  on  a  firm  personal  religious  faith.  He 
at  once  displayed  unusual  power  as  a  debater, 
participating  in  freshman  year  in  the  debate 
between  Beloit  and  Ripon.  In  his  sophomore 
year  he  was  chosen  in  the  preliminary  contests 
to  represent  Beloit  in  the  debate  with  Knox, 
but  declined  to  accept,  feeling  that  the  upper- 
class  man  who  would  otherwise  have  had  the 
place  would  strengthen  the  team,  and  that  he 
himself  had  better  wait.  His  reward  came  to 
him  later. 

He  faced  for  himself  the  question  whether 
he  should  give  athletics  or  scholarship  the  first 
place  in  his  thought.  Early  in  his  course 
he  wrote  to  his  parents  on  the  issue  as  it  pre- 
sented itself  to  him : 

"Of  course,  a  fine  athlete  may  also  be  a  fine 
scholar.     I   have   known   a    few    such.     The 


Henry  Dickinson  Smith  75 

combination  is  not  impossible,  but  improbable, 
and  extremely  rare.  The  reason  is  that  train- 
ing takes  so  much  time  and  strength  that  few 
men  have  enough  left  to  make  good  scholars, 
and,  besides,  an  enthusiastic  athlete  is  very  apt 
to  do  this  one  thing  and  have  very  little  in- 
terest in  anything  else.  A  good  athlete  must 
be  careful  in  his  diet,  regular  in  his  training, 
and  must  never  sit  up  late.  A  good  student 
is  often  obliged  to  study  hard  and  long.  A 
man  may  start  out  with  the  intention  of  doing 
both  things  well,  but  sooner  or  later  they  are 
most  sure  to  conflict.  He  will  find  himself 
face  to  face  with  four  or  five  hours  of  hard 
studying,  which  must  be  done  before  to-mor- 
row. Then  he  has  to  make  his  choice.  H 
athletics  are  uppermost  in  his  mind,  he  will 
study  what  he  can,  and  then  go  to  bed.  If 
this  happens  often,  his  scholarship  will  suffer. 
Then,  since  he  has  lost  one  ideal,  he  will  devote 
himself  more  to  the  other.  After  this  he  may 
be  a  good  athlete,  but  unless  he  stops  training 
he  will  probably  never  be  a  good  scholar.  The 
extreme  opposite  of  these  are  those  whose 
whole  existence  is  bound  up  in  books.  They 
seldom  witness  a  baseball  or  football  game, 
and  never  think  of  taking  part  in  one.  They 
take  no  interest  in  athletics  or  society,  and  if 
one  of  them  joins  a  debating  society  it  is  with 
a  view  to  studying  rhetoric. 

"  A  third  class  are  interested  in  athletics  and 
society,  but  not  to  the  exclusion  of  studying. 
Though  they  may  study  hard,  it  is  always  with 
limits.     They  are  moderately  esteemed  by  the 


76        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

professors,  though  they  may  never  be  brilHant 
in  any  Hue.  An  athlete  may  meet  with  con- 
tinual disapproval  of  the  faculty,  and  yet  be  a 
popular  hero,  while  a  hard  student  may  have 
the  profound  admiration  of  every  professor, 
and  yet  be  disliked  by  his  classmates  and  the 
college.  I  have  settled  for  myself  that  I  will 
not  join  the  first  class.  I  am  passionately  fond 
of  football  and  moderately  fond  of  baseball, 
but  not  fond  enough  of  either  to  let  them 
crowd  out  my  studies,  nor  to  give  them  the 
attention  necessary  to  those  who  get  on  the 
team.  Between  the  other  two  the  choice  is 
harder." 

He  worked  hard  in  his  class  work,  but  the 
competitive  excitement  of  the  college  debates, 
leading  on  to  the  intercollegiate  contests,  ap- 
pealed to  him  most.  In  these  contests  he  won 
his  way  to  victory  through  defeat.  In  one  of 
the  first  struggles  of  junior  3^ear  he  was  de- 
feated, after  seven  weeks  of  incessant  prepara- 
tion. ''  I  have  met  defeat  before,"  he  wrote. 
"  Never  one  quite  like  this.  It  came  as  a 
storm  from  the  blue  sky.  It  crushed  the  life 
out  of  me  and  took  away  all  my  energy.  I 
can't  seem  to  get  up  any  interest  in  oratory 
now,  although  but  a  short  time  ago  it  was  the 
principal  ambition  of  my  life."  But  later  in 
the  year  he  was  chosen  leader  of  the  Beloit 
team  of  three  in  the  debate  with  Knox  College. 


Henry  Dickinson  Smith  77 

The  question  for  debate  was  the  value  and 
influence  of  Labour  Unions.  Henry  went 
to  Chicago  during  his  spring  vacation  to  study 
union  labour  on  the  ground,  and  he  and  his  as- 
sociates made  every  preparation  for  the  con- 
test, and  just  before  going  to  the  hall  met  in 
Henry's  room  at  the  hotel  in  Galesburg,  and, 
as  he  wrote  home,  *'  I  said  we  were  all  three 
Y.M.C.A.  men,  and  that  it  was  a  good  time 
to  keep  our  Christianity  with  us.  Then,  bow- 
ing our  heads  for  a  few  minutes,  we  prayed 
that,  whether  we  won  or  lost,  we  might  not  at 
any  time  forget  that  we  were  sons  of  Beloit 
and  Christian  gentlemen."  It  was  an  excit- 
ing contest,  and  Beloit  lost.  It  was  a  terrible 
disappointment  to  him,  but  he  was  soon  able  to 
view  it  philosophically.  As  he  wrote  in  a  later 
letter :  "  I  think  I  told  you  my  college  experi- 
ence up  to  and  including  the  Knox  debate. 
Lucius  Porter  and  I  were  very  much  disap- 
pointed at  the  result,  and  I  felt  exceedingly 
tired  after  four  months  of  extremely  strenu- 
ous work.  There  are  some  disadvantages  about 
working  on  an  intercollegiate  debate,  but  I  be- 
lieve it  is  worth  all  it  costs.  Few  men  can 
have  the  privilege  of  taking  part  in  such  a 
contest,  and  no  one  who  has  not  can  under- 
stand how  much  it  is  worth.  Last  year's  de- 
bate was  of  more  use  to  me  in  teaching  me 


yS        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

how  to  face  the  world,  how  to  deal  with  men, 
and  how  to  enter  the  battles  of  life,  than  any 
other  semester  of  study  that  I  have  spent  in 
college.  I  have  been  asked  to  go  in  for  it 
again,  and  am  seriously  considering  the  idea. 
I  would  like  nothing  better  than  to  win  one 
decisive  victory  for  Old  Beloit  before  I  gradu- 
ate.    It  would  be  worth  all  it  cost." 

He  gathered  lessons,  also,  from  a  defeat  at 
Commencement  time  in  the  contest  in  extem- 
poraneous speaking.     Describing  it,  he  wrote: 

"  No  defeat  is  tolerable  to  me  till  I  have 
learned  some  useful  lesson  from  it.  I  have 
learned  two  things :  I  must  improve  my  de- 
livery, especially  in  learning  to  talk  more 
slowly.  It  will  be  only  by  doing  more  work 
than  others  that  I  can  rely  on  any  superiority." 

In  the  vacation  between  junior  and  senior 
years  he  attended  the  Student  Summer  Con- 
ference at  Lake  Geneva,  and  then  decided  that 
he  would  make  foreign  missions  his  life  work, 
as  it  was  his  father's.  "  Have  felt  much  bet- 
ter since,"  he  wrote.  "  My  doubts  and 
troubles  have  lasted  for  several  years,  and 
are  only  just  now  beginning  to  get  cleared 
up." 

In  the  fall  of  1901  he  returned  to  Beloit  for 
his  last  and  best  year.     He  went  in  for  ath- 


Henry  Dickinson  Smith  79 

letics,  and  became  captain  of  the  second  foot- 
ball team.  He  was  interested,  also,  in  all  the 
general  work  of  the  college.  He  was  on  the 
editorial  board  of  one  of  the  college  publica- 
tions, president  of  the  English  Club,  active  in 
the  oratorical  contest  (in  which  he  won  third 
place),  and,  most  notable  of  all,  the  leader  in 
the  triumphant  victory  of  Beloit  over  Knox 
in  the  debate  between  the  two  colleges.  He 
also  coached  the  freshman  and  sophomore  de- 
bating teams  to  a  successful  issue  in  their 
contests  with  Ripon  and  Carleton  Colleges, 
and  he  won  the  Hay  prize  for  the  best  essay 
on  a  topic  connected  with  American  citizen- 
ship. Of  the  Knox  debate  Professor  Collie 
of  Beloit  wrote :  "  Henry  was  a  power  in  de- 
bate, and  became,  perhaps,  the  most  famous 
of  undergraduate  debaters  in  our  history.  In 
this  debate,  1902,  Beloit  had  apparently  lost, 
when  Henry  rose  to  make  his  argument  in  re- 
buttal. No  one  present  will  be  likely  to  for- 
get that  speech.  His  generalship,  his  quick 
wit,  with  his  eager,  passionate  argument, 
simply  swept  the  Knox  men  from  their  feet, 
and  Beloit  won  the  decision.  The  ambition  of 
the  college  youth  was  satisfied.  Eager  in- 
tensity and  strength  carried  the  day." 

Beloit  had  done  its  best  with  the  fine  man- 
hood material  it  had  received  in  him,  and  he 


8o        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

went  out  grateful  for  what  it  had  given  him. 
His  gratitude  was  deepest  to  the  heroic  in- 
valid to  whose  character  and  courage  he  owed 
most.     As  he  wrote  to  his  family : 

"  My  most  solemn  farewell  was  to  the  col- 
lege library,  silent  and  deserted  now.  One 
spot  in  it  is  forever  sacred  to  me.  Professor 
Bacon's  wheelchair  used  to  stand  there,  and 
he  used  to  work  there  every  day.  For  three 
years  I  watched  him  work  there ;  for  two  years 
I  worked  and  studied  with  him ;  for  one  year  I 
was  his  right-hand  man,  and,  after  he  had 
gone  '  Over  there,'  I  still  worked  on  that  spot. 
There  I  had  vowed  to  beat  Ripon,  if  it  were 
possible  to  overcome  such  odds  as  we  fresh- 
men fought  against  that  year,  and  to  that  spot 
I  returned  forlorn  and  comfortless  to  gather 
fresh  resolve.  On  that  spot  I  had  vow^ed,  as 
a  junior,  to  defeat  Knox  if  it  could  be  done. 
Here  Professor  Bacon  had  bidden  me  god- 
speed with  his  firm  warm  handclasp  and  his 
cheery  voice,  '  God  bless  you,  Henry ;  go  in 
and  do  your  best.'  Two  days  later,  when  T 
returned  beaten,  but  not  conquered,  his  earnest, 
vibrant  voice  greeted  me  with,  '  Well,  Henry, 
there  are  three  hundred  and  sixty-three  days  to 
the  next  Knox  debate.'  His  indomitable  cour- 
age was  contagious.  On  this  very  spot  I  had 
solemnly  sworn  that  I  would  fight  one  more 
battle  to  the  very  end,  and  to  this  place  I  re- 
turned after  the  bonfire  had  burned  out,  and 
the  shouts  had  died  away,  and  the  crowd  had 
gone  home,  the  night  of  the  Knox  debate,  to 


Henry  Dickinson  Smith  8i 

thank  God  for  my  first  victory.  On  this  same 
spot  I  lingered  in  farewell.  The  finest  stu- 
dents I  had  ever  known  had  worked  here,  and 
grown  under  Professor  Bacon's  care  into 
splendid  men.  The  place  was  consecrated  hy 
his  heroic  life  and  death. 


O  God,  to  us  may  grace  be  given 
To  follow  in  their  train.' 


I  thought  a  moment,  and  prayed  on  that  spot. 
No  place  has  ever  been  associated,  for  me, 
with  so  much  of  the  strenuous  endeavour  and 
purposeful  resolve." 

The  next  two  years  he  taught  at  Forest 
Grove,  Oregon,  entering  into  all  the  life  of 
the  students,  helping  them  in  their  athletics 
and  debates,  and  working  a  way  deep  into  their 
hearts.  In  vacation  times  he  turned  his  hand 
to  business  with  his  old  success.  He  went  on 
the  road  as  a  drummer  for  a  hardware  house. 
"  The  first  customer  upon  whom  I  called  said : 
*  Why,  there  was  a  man  around  here  yesterday 
trying  to  sell  a  lot  of  that  stuff.'  To  which  I 
responded  with  cheerful  recklessness,  '  I  have 
no  doubt  of  it.  There  will  probably  be  an- 
other to-morrow,  and  I'm  four  weeks  ahead  of 
the  man  who  will  be  here  a  month  from  now, 
but  we've  got  the  very  thing  you  want,  and  at 


82        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

the  right  price.'  I  stayed  with  the  gentleman 
more  than  an  hour,  and  returned  with  an  order 
for  more  than  four  hundred  dollars'  worth  of 
assorted  hardware." 

He  came  back  from  Tacoma  to  Forest 
Grove,  one  hundred  and  seventy-five  miles, 
to  vote  for  "  No  License."  "  I  know  a 
moral  issue  when  I  see  one,"  he  wrote, 
"  and  I  don't  believe  there  is  any  man 
in  Oregon  more  anxious  than  I  am  to  '  get  in 
the  game  '  when  a  hot  fight  is  raging  over  a 
moral  issue.  We  won  by  a  majority  of  forty- 
one." 

From  Forest  Grove  he  returned  to  Beloit. 
He  had  done  good  work  in  Oregon.  As  he 
wrote  to  his  father :  "  I  work  hard  from  morn- 
ing to  night,  and  shall  stoutly  defend  my  right 
to  do  so.  '  Idleness  is  the  American  Hell.' 
Of  course,  I  work  hard.  I  think  the  results 
justify  me.  The  football  team  tied  with  the 
best  in  the  State.  The  orator  whom  I  trained 
won  the  State  oratorical  contest.  Our  debat- 
ing team  went  one  hundred  and  fifty  miles  and 
w^hipped  the  State  University  on  their  own 
grounds.  When  I  came  the  college  loyalty 
was  low,  athletics  and  debating  were  in  a 
most  discouraging  condition.  This  year  we 
have  won  everything.  Of  one  thing  I  am 
sure:  If  I  ever  make  a  success  of  anything  in 


Henry  Dickinson  Smith  83 

life,  it  will  not  be  through  talent  or  inspira- 
tion, but  through  hard  work.  I  never  expect 
to  do  less  than  the  very  best  I  can." 

In  this  spirit  he  spent  the  next  year  working 
for  Beloit  College,  making  the  institution  and 
its  influence  better  known  throughout  the 
Northwest,  and  drawing  young  men  and 
women  thither  for  a  college  training  under 
the  Christian  principles  which  governed  the 
institution.  The  result  was  the  largest  enter- 
ing class  ever  known  in  the  history  of  the  col- 
lege, 55  per  cent,  larger  than  the  class  of  the 
preceding  year.  Of  his  work  as  secretary  of 
the  college,  Professor  Collie  wrote: 

"  The  Greater  Beloit  will  come  in  the  future, 
and  it  will  be  Henry  Smith's  credit  that  he 
gave  it  the  first  great  impulse  in  the  forward 
direction.  His  methods  of  advertising  the 
college  were  models  of  their  kind,  and  will 
set  a  standard  at  Beloit  for  years  to  come." 

The  time  had  now  come,  he  felt,  to  go  on 
with  his  theological  preparation  for  mission- 
ary work,  and  the  fall  of  1905  found  him  at 
New  Haven  in  the  Yale  Divinity  School.  "  I 
mean  to  settle  down  quietly  at  Yale,"  he  wrote, 
''  live  simply,  study  hard,  think  deeply,  pray 
more,  worry  less,  and  sympathize  always.  It 
is  not  hard  for  me  to  do  things,  it  is  very  hard 


84        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

to  live  quietly  and  think  deeply.     The  man 
who  does  not  do  so  is  shallow." 

There  were  ten  Beloit  men  in  the  Divinity 
School,  and  they  entered  into  the  life  of  the 
school  and  the  university,  Henry  wrote  to 
the  Beloit  College  paper,  of  which  he  had  once 
been  editor : 

"  We  have  found  Yale  simply  splendid. 
One  can't  help  being  enthusiastic  about  it. 
The  Yale  spirit  is  magnificent,  and  the  oppor- 
tunities tremendous.  The  Beloit  delegation 
are  trying  to  give  an  account  of  themselves 
here.  Three  of  the  four  editors  of  the  Divin- 
ity Quarterly  are  Beloit  men,  and  the  Divinity 
choir  is  made  up  entirely  of  Beloit  men.  The 
work  is  mighty  hard  here,  and  does  not  leave 
much  time  for  fun." 

And  later  he  wrote  to  the  paper  an  enthusi- 
astic article  on  "  The  Yale-Princeton  Game  " : 

"  To  a  Westerner  one  of  the  most  attractive 
features  of  Yale  life  is  the  intense  enthusiasm 
and  loyalty  of  the  students  and  alumni  for 
their  Alma  Mater.  A  new  student  feels  its 
influence  at  once,  and  finds  it  getting  a  stronger 
grip  upon  him  as  months  and  years  pass. 
This  spirit  appears  in  many  ways  and  places. 
In  the  fall  the  chief  interest  centers  about  the 
football  games,  and  it  is  there  that  the  great- 
est demonstrations  of  the  Yale  spirit  may  be 
seen.  .  .  . 


Henry  Dickinson  Smith  85 

"  After  the  game  the  Yale  brass  band  led 
the  way  round  the  field,  followed  by  two  thou- 
sand Yale  men,  eight  or  ten  abreast,  arms 
locked,  joyously  dancing  the  serpentine.  Be- 
fore the  cheering  section  of  the  orange  and 
black  they  pause  to  give  a  long  cheer  for 
Princeton's  men,  which  is  heartily  returned. 
One  side  is  happ}/-,  and  both  are  satisfied,  for 
both  have  done  their  best,  and  there  is  no 
greater  victory  than  that.  As  the  happy 
throng  moves  homeward  one  cannot  help 
catching  a  little  of  the  Yale  spirit  from  their 
chorus : 

"  '  In  after  years  should  trouble  rise 

To  cloud  the  blue  of  sunny  skies, 

How  bright  will  seem,  through  memory's  haze, 

The  happy,  golden,  bygone  days.'  " 

In  Yale  he  led  the  Divinity  School  debating 
team  in  a  victory  over  the  Law  School,  and 
was  leader  also  of  the  Yale  team  in  a  debate 
with  Harvard  which  Harvard  won.  His 
father  came  back  from  China  this  winter,  and 
Henry  met  him  in  New  York  in  January. 
"  We  went  right  up  to  my  room  at  the  hotel," 
he  writes  to  his  mother,  ''  to  talk  it  over,  and 
then  Pater  said : '  Come,  Honey  Bee  [his  child- 
hood nickname],  let's  have  a  prayer.'  Isn't 
that  just  like  him?  Of  course,  we  had  a  tre- 
mendous lot  of  back  conversation  to  make  up, 


86        Alen  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

and  I  don't  see  when  we  are  ever  to  catch  up. 
He  talks  about  two  hundred  and  fifty 
words  to  the  minute,  and  I  do  the 
same — that  makes  five  hundred;  but  there 
aren't  minutes  enough." 

Father  and  son  found  each  in  the  other  his 
satisfying  joy,  and  they  were  together  as  much 
as  the  work  of  either  would  allow.  Henry 
was  called  on  to  attempt  in  a  small  measure 
for  the  Divinity  School  what  he  had  done  for 
Beloit  in  the  matter  of  drawing  new  students, 
and  in  the  summer  returned  to  Beloit  to  re- 
peat for  the  college  the  work  he  had  done  be- 
fore. 

And  it  was  in  this  summer  that  the  brilliant 
life  ended  here  on  earth.  In  August  he  went 
to  Lake  Geneva  for  a  rest.  With  two  friends 
he  went  swimming  on  the  morning  of  Aug- 
ust 7th.  One  of  the  two  friends  had  al- 
ready gone  into  the  lake,  and  was  seen  to  be 
struggling  in  water  too  deep  for  her.  Henry 
at  once  went  in  to  her  assistance,  and  was 
pulled  down  by  her.  Help  came  soon,  and 
the  bodies  were  rescued.  With  Miss  Macum- 
ber  life  was  extinct,  but  after  many  hours  of 
work  there  was  a  faint  flicker  of  life  with 
Henry,  and  then  a  slow  return  to  conscious- 
ness. "  Then  followed  the  delicate  task  of 
maintaining  the  life  thus  feebly  restored.     Un- 


Henry  Dickinson  Smith  87 

der  ordinary  circumstances  there  was  a  fair 
chance  that  the  dear  patient  might  be  fully 
recovered.  He  had,  it  is  true,  greatly  ex- 
hausted his  nervous  energy  in  the  continuous 
effort  of  the  summer.  When  he  slowly 
opened  his  eyes  and  began  to  speak  in  a  feeble 
way,  he  could  not  recall  the  situation,  wonder- 
ing where  he  might  be.  The  night  wore  away, 
and  a  new  morning  dawned,  while  the  effort  to 
sustain  his  strength  went  on.  At  last  it  be- 
came evident  that  his  vital  force  was  slowly 
ebbing  once  more.  At  the  end  of  twenty-one 
hours  of  this  remarkable  effort,  due  to  the  pa- 
tient solicitude  of  Dr.  and  Mrs.  Collie,  the 
precious  life  succumbed  to  exhaustion." 

The  body  was  laid  to  rest  in  Beloit,  where  so 
much  of  his  life  had  been  richly  lived.  On 
the  coffin  Miss  Macumber's  parents  laid  a 
wreath  with  the  words,  "  Greater  love  hath 
no  man  than  this,  that  a  man  lay  down  his  life 
for  his  friends."  And  far  away  in  Kuling,  in 
China,  the  word  of  the  death  of  their  only 
son,  and  the  last  of  their  three  children, 
reached  two  aging  lives  which  had  given  all 
to  God,  and  which  did  not  complain  even  now 
in  the  uttermost  of  human  sorrow. 

The  Yale  Divinity  Quarterly  gave  restrained 
expression  to  its  sense  of  loss  in  Henry's 
death : 


88        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

"  Mr.  Smith  was  characterized  by  a  brihiant 
wit,  a  remarkable  executive  abiHty,  and  an 
unusual  power  of  concentration.  His  enthusi- 
asm for  any  work  in  which  he  was  interested 
was  almost  unbounded,  and  he  could  put  en- 
thusiasm into  others.  He  was  most  unselfish 
in  his  disposition,  modest  and  retiring"  in  man- 
ner, and  had  a  deeply  spiritual  nature.  The 
foreign  mission  service  was  to  have  been  his 
life  work,  as  he  had  already  applied  to  the 
American  Board  for  appointment,  when  he 
had  completed  his  Divinity  course.  His  prom- 
ise for  future  usefulness  w^as  most  unusual, 
and  his  loss  is  one  that  will  be  inestimable  to 
the  Divinity  School,  the  mission  field  in  China, 
and  to  all  his  friends  East  and  West.  The 
strong  characteristics  of  his  life  will  always 
be  an  inspiration  to  all  who  knew  him." 

The  intense,  eager,  hopeful,  unresting  life  is 
busy  still,  we  may  be  sure,  in  the  work  of  that 
Kingdom  in  which  it  served  on  earth.  And 
the  gift  of  such  lives  to  God  is  not  too  great 
a  gift,  remembering  His  gift  once  to  men. 

"  Why  callest  Thou  the  stainless  knight. 

With  sword  scarce  proved  against  the  foe. 
Why  leavest  us,  with  many  a  fight. 
Wearied  and  scarred,  and  fain  to  go? 

"  Yet  this  we  dimly  understand, 
That  Life  Eternal  is  our  own, 
And  that  the  unseen  Other  Land 
Is  ours,  and  not  this  Land  alone. 


Henry  Dickinson  Smith  89 

Once  Thou  didst  lose  Thy  Son  awhile, 
On  a  strange  errand,  full  of  pain, 

Yet  with  a  Father's  welcoming  smile 
Didst  proudly  take  Him  home  again. 

So  now  we  say:  If  life  be  one 
And  Thou  of  Life  the  Ruler  be, 

Dear  God,  Who  gavest  us  Thy  Son, 
Behold  we  give  our  sons  to  Thee." 


VI 

THREE  FAITHFUL  MEN  OF  PRAYER 

IN  1 80 1  an  eighteen-year-old  boy  had  a  talk 
with  his  mother  just  as  he  was  about  to 
leave  home  to  enter  the  Morris  Academy, 
South  Farms,  Litchfield,  Connecticut.  The 
boy  was  burdened  of  soul,  and  even  after  his 
mother's  loving  counsel  he  set  off  with  a  heavy 
heart.  The  mother  went  to  her  room  and 
prayed  as  only  a  mother  can  pray.  As  she 
prayed  and  Samuel  Mills  went  on  his  way, 
there  came  to  him  a  great  new  sense  of  God, 
and  there  and  then  he  stopped  in  the  woods 
by  the  roadside  to  pray  for  himself  and  to  give 
himself  over  to  the  God  who  had  so  clearl}^ 
come  to  him. 

Five  years  later  the  boy  was  in  Williams 
College,  and  kneeling  with  four  companions 
under  the  haystack,  where  Mills  had  sum- 
moned them  with  the  words,  *'  Come,  let  us 
make  it  a  subject  of  prayer  under  the  hay- 
stack, while  the  dark  clouds  are  going  and 
the  clear  sky  is  coming."     There  they  knelt 

to  pray   that   the   churches   might   awake   to 

90 


Three  Faithful  Men  of  Prayer         91 

send  out  missionaries  to  the  heathen.  And 
there  and  in  the  impulse  which  grew  out  of 
these  prayers  American  foreign  missions  were 
born.  The  work  did  not  begin  for  some  years, 
but  it  may  be  safely  said  that  it  was  Mills 
who  prayed  it  into  existence. 

The  man  of  prayer  could  not  be  content 
with  small  unprayerful  schemes.  "  Though 
you  and  I  are  very  little  beings,"  he  wrote 
to  Elias  Cornelius,  "  we  must  not  rest  sat- 
isfied till  we  have  made  our  influence  extend 
to  the  remotest  corner  of  this  ruined  world." 
''  I  intend,  God  willing,"  he  wrote  in  a  letter 
declining  to  settle  in  the  Western  Reserve, 
"  that  the  little  influence  I  have  shall  be  felt 
in  every  State  in  the  Union." 

So  he  moved  out  on  great  home  mission 
tours  through  the  Louisiana  Purchase,  and, 
as  a  result,  prayed  and  planned  the  American 
Bible  Society  into  existence.  "  That  Soci- 
ety," says  Mills's  last  biographer,  "  was  the 
child  of  his  efforts  and  prayers."  New  York 
City,  however,  to  which  he  had  returned,  was 
too  small  for  him.  "  I  am  pestered  in  this  pin- 
hole," he  wrote.  The  vision  of  prayer  led 
him  out  to  Africa.  He  put  himself  and  his 
prayers  into  the  Colonization  Society  Move- 
ment, and  then,  in  1817,  set  off  himself  for 
the  Dark  Continent.     The  natives,  who  had 


92        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

seen  a  different  kind  of  white  man,  ''  were 
greatly  surprised  at  the  devotion  of  Mills  and 
Burgess,  and  one  said  that  he  never  knew  be- 
fore that  white  men  prayed."  On  his  way 
home  from  Africa,  in  June,  1818,  he  died  at 
sea,  having  gently  closed  his  hands  on  his 
heart  as  if  in  prayer. 

"  Like  every  true  man  of  God,"  says  Mr. 
Richards,  "  he  was  a  man  of  prayer.  His 
plans  were  all  prayed  out.  Upon  his  knees 
he  fought  out  the  l3attles  of  his  life.  To  his 
Father  he  went  with  all  his  doubts  and  diffi- 
culties. It  was  his  custom  to  go  alone  or  with 
a  comrade  for  long  walks  in  the  woods  round 
about  Williams  and  Andover,  to  pray  and  med- 
itate. Much  of  the  time  in  the  student  meet- 
ings was  taken  with  prayer.  Contrary  to  the 
usual  custom,  these  prayers  were  short.  But 
they  were  deeply  reverent,  and  filled  with  im- 
passioned utterance.  He  was  never  selfish  in 
his  prayer;  he  seldom  prayed  aloud  for  him- 
self, but  ardently  for  others.  One  peculiar 
form  he  often  used  was,  '  We  praise  Thee  that 
we  belong  to  a  race  of  beings  who  were  made 
by  Jesus  Christ,  and  who  have  been  redeemed 
by  His  blood.' 

"  Not  only  did  he  have  his  usual  devotional 
periods  every  day,  but  when  some  special 
burden  rested  upon  him,  or  when  some  new 
plan  was  working  out,  or  when  the  way  was 
dark,  he  would  also  set  apart  a  day  of  fasting 
and  prayer,  and  wrestle  with  the  Almighty, 


Three  Faithful  Men  of  Prayer         93  i 

1 

until  he  felt  the  assurance  that  his  prayer  was  \ 

heard.  \ 

*'  If  he  prayed  as  though  all  depended  on  j 

God,  he  worked  as  though  everything  depended  | 

on  his  own  labours.     He  not  only  expected  1 
great  things   from  God,   he  attempted  great 
things  for  God." 

Do  we  only  expect  or  do  we  also  attempt  by 
prayer?  ^/ex5(^ 

■\ 

In   August,    1865,   the   ship    Wild   Rover,  ' 

owned  by  Alpheus  Hardy  &  Co.  of  Boston,  J 

returned  to  the  home  port  from  China,  bring-  ;; 

ing  a  young  Japanese  who  had  run  away  from  ^ 

Japan  in  order  to  learn  the  English  language,  ; 

so  that  he  might  be  able  to  translate  the  Bible  j 
into  his  own  tongue  for  the  benefit  of  his  coun- 
trymen.    He  knew  only  what  w^ords  he  had 

picked  up  on  the  ship,  and  when  Mr.  Hardy  ] 

questioned  him   he  answered  only   in  mono-  ' 
syllables.     Within  a   few  days,   however,   he 

gave  Mr.   Hardy  a  quaint  statement,  telling  i 
his  whole  history. 

i 

"  A  day  I  visited  my  friend,  and  I  found  ' 

out  small  Holy  Bible  in  his  library  that  was  i 
written  by  some  American  minister  with  China 

language,  and  had  shown  only  the  most  re-  '• 

markable  events  of  it.     I  lend  it  from  him  and  J 
read  it  at  night,  because  I  was  afraid  the  sav- 


94        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

age  country's  law,  which  if  I  read  the  Bible, 
Government  wnll  cross  whole  my  family.  I 
understood  God  at  first,  and  He  separated  the 
earth  from  firmament,  made  light  upon  the 
earth,  made  grass,  trees,  creatures,  fowls,  fishes. 
And  He  created  a  man  in  His  own  image,  and 
made  up  a  woman,  cutting  a  man's  side  bone. 
After  He  made  up  all  things  of  universe  He 
took  a  rest.  That  day  we  must  call  Sunday  or 
Sabbath  Day.  I  understand  that  Jesus  Christ 
was  Son  of  Holy  Ghost,  and  He  was  crossed 
for  the  sins  of  all  the  world;  therefore  we  must 
call  Him  our  Saviour.  Then  I  put  down  the 
book  and  looked  around  me,  saying  that :  Who 
made  me?  My  parents?  No,  God.  Who 
made  my  table  ?  A  carpenter  ?  No,  my  God. 
God  let  trees  grow  upon  the  earth,  and  al- 
though God  let  a  carpenter  made  up  my  table, 
it  indeed  came  from  some  tree.  Then  I  must 
be  thankful  to  God,  I  must  believe  Him,  and  I 
must  be  upright  against  Him.  From  that  time 
my  mind  was  fulfilled  to  read  English  Bible, 
and  purposed  to  go  to  Hakodate  to  get  English 
or  American  teacher  of  it.  Therefore  I  asked 
of  my  prince  and  parents  to  go  thither.  But 
they  had  not  allowed  to  me  for  it,  and  were 
alarmed  at  it.  But  my  stableness  would  not 
destroy  by  my  expostulations,  and  I  kept  such 
thoughts,  praying  only  to  God :  Please !  let  me 
reach  my  aim." 

So  Neesima  began  his  great  career  in  prayer. 
Mr.  Hardy  sent  him  to  Phillips  Academy  at 
Andover,  then  to  Amherst  College,  then  to  An- 


Three  Faithful  Men  of  Prayer  95 

dover  Theological  Seminary.  His  letters 
show  that,  earnest  as  he  was  in  all  his  studies, 
he  was  not  less  earnest  in  his  inner  life  of 
prayer.  He  felt  the  burden  of  his  mission, 
and  knew  that  his  only  help  for  himself  and 
for  all  that  he  longed  to  see  done  was  in  God. 

''  I  have  a  plough  on  my  hands,"  he  wrote  to 
Mrs.  Hardy  from  Andover.  ''  I  must  work 
for  my  Lord.  It  is  my  earnest  prayer  for  my 
parents  that  God  should  spare  their  lives  until 
the  light  of  truth  and  life  be  preached  to  them. 
I  thank  God  for  what  He  has  done  for  me 
always." 

In  1872  the  Iwakura  Embassy  came  from 
Japan  to  America  and  Europe  to  investigate 
all  things  and  to  report  to  its  own  country 
what  ought  to  be  adopted  by  Japan.  On 
reaching  Washington  the  Embassy  summoned 
Neesima  to  inform  it  about  the  system  of 
American  education. 

''  So  I  have  been  studying  it  since  last 
week,"  writes  Neesima.  "  It  gives  me  plenty 
to  do.  I  will  go  to  Washington  as  soon  as  the 
Japanese  Embassy  arrive  there.  I  expect  to 
stand  up  for  Christ  before  the  heathen  Em- 
bassy. I  think  it  is  a  good  opportunity  for  me 
to  speak  Christ.  I  wish  you  would  make  spe- 
cial prayer  for  me,  and  also  for  the  Em- 
bassy." 


96        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

He  was  invited  to  join  the  Embassy  in  its 
work,  and  accompanied  it  to  Europe,  praying 
ever  and  asking  others  to  pray  for  these  men 
of  great  influence  with  whom  he  was  asso- 
ciated, that  they  might  become  disciples  of  the 
Saviour. 

''  I  wish  you  would  offer  special  prayer  for 
that  one  who  has  just  begun  to  study  with  me," 
he  writes  from  Berlin  of  a  Japanese  friend, 
"  that  the  thick  unbelieving  scales  may  fall 
from  his  eyes  and  he  may  see  the  gentle  Sa- 
viour standing  by  him." 

When  his  preparation  was  done  he  went 
back  and  founded  the  great  Christian  college 
at  Kyoto.  He  founded  and  maintained  it  in 
prayer.  While  on  a  sea  voyage  his  journal 
reads : 

*'  April  7.  Prayer  for  theological  students. 
We  passed  through  the  Straits  of  Shimo- 
noseki  at  5.30.  The  weather  was  fair,  and 
I  was  not  sick  at  all. 

"  April  8.     Prayer  for  the  fifth  year  class." 

This  was  the  man  as  he  lived  and  as  he 
died — dwelling  near  to  God,  and  knowing  Him 
as  the  hearer  and  answerer  of  prayer. 

On  April  8,  1901,  on  Goaribari  Island  m 
the  South  Seas,  the  man  for  whom  Robert 


Three  Faithful  Men  of  Prayer  97 

Louis  Stevenson,  as  his  biographer  tells  us, 
"  felt  a  kind  of  hero  worship,  a  greater  ad- 
miration, probably,  than  he  felt  for  any  man 
of  modern  times,  except  Charles  Gordon,"  was 
killed  and  eaten  by  cannibals.  James  Chal- 
mers was  his  name  in  Great  Britain. 
"  Tamate  of  New  Guinea,"  he  was  known  in 
the  South  Seas.  "  Christmas  I  go  to  Auck- 
land," wrote  Stevenson  in  December,  1890, 
''  to  meet  Tamate,  the  New  Guinea  mission- 
ary, a  man  I  love." 

Prayer  was  always  the  very  central  power 
and  vitality  of  his  work.  In  August,  1891, 
he  wrote  to  his  friend,  Mr.  Searle  of  Kew, 
Victoria,  Australia,  a  letter  to  be  read  to  a 
class  of  young  men.  He  told  of  the  work  and 
the  new  teachers  sent  out  to  new  places.  Then 
he  broke  forth: 

"  I  want  you  to  pray,  just  here,  for  these 
men  and  women.  A  special  prayer,  that  the}^ 
may  soon  know  the  language,  and  be  made 
wise  to  turn  souls,  that  their  lives  may  be 
spared  in  holiness  and  honour  to  a  real,  good 
old  age,  without  any  looking  back.  I  don't 
like  the  looking  back." 

And  he  closed  his  letter: 

"  I  am  anxious  to  visit  all  our  stations  be- 
fore going  to  the  Fly  River.     I  feel  sure  you 


98        Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

are  praying  for  us,  and  I  know  we  shall  not 
be  forgotten  by  you  in  the  future.  Do  not  ex- 
pect too  much.  Forced  work  is  unhealthy, 
and  manufactured  converts  do  not  last  long. 
Let  the  work  grow  with  our  lives,  and  in  God's 
own  good  time  there  will  be  a  temple  worthy 
of  His  praise." 

To  him  to  live  was  to  pray.  He  wrote  to 
an  anxious  friend,  ''  Don't  make  plans  till  you 
have  prayed  about  it  or  you  will  spoil  it  all." 

He  tells  us  himself  how,  as  a  small  lad,  the 
missionary  call  came  to  him  and  was  sealed  by 
prayer : 

"  I  remember  it  well.  Our  Sunday-school 
class  had  been  held  in  the  vestry  as  usual.  The 
lesson  was  finished,  and  we  had  marched  back 
into  the  chapel  to  sing,  answer  questions,  and 
to  listen  to  a  short  address.  I  was  sitting  at 
the  head  of  the  seat,  and  can  even  now  see  Mr. 
Meikle  taking  from  his  breast  pocket  a  copy 
of  the  United  Presbyterian  Record,  and  hear 
him  say  that  he  was  going  to  read  an  interest- 
ing letter  to  us  from  a  missionary  in  Fiji.  The 
letter  was  read.  It  spoke  of  cannibalism  and 
of  the  power  of  the  gospel,  and  at  the  close 
of  the  reading,  looking  over  his  spectacles,  and 
with  wet  eyes,  he  said,  *  I  wonder  if  there  is  a 
boy  here  this  afternoon  who  will  yet  become  a 
missionary,  and  by  and  by  take  the  gospel  to 
cannibals?'  And  the  response  of  my  heart 
was,  '  Yes,  God  helping  me,  and  I  will.'     So 


Three  Faithful  Men  of  Prayer  99 

impressed  was  I  that  I  spoke  to  no  one,  but 
went  right  away  towards  home.  The  im- 
pression became  greater  the  further  I  went,  un- 
til I  got  to  the  bridge  over  the  Aray  above  the 
mill  and  near  to  the  Black  Bull.  There  I  went 
over  the  wall  attached  to  the  bridge,  and, 
kneeling  down,  prayed  God  to  accept  of  me, 
and  to  make  me  a  missionary  to  the  heathen." 


As  he  began  he  lived.  The  boy  who  prayed 
was  a  boy  and  a  boy  who  prayed  always. 
*'  He  fulfilled  to  the  full,"  said  a  classmate, 
"  the  great  thought  of  Joubert — *  Let  us  be 
men  with  men,  but  always  children  with  God; 
for  in  His  eyes  we  are  but  children.'  He  car- 
ried the  child's  heait  with  him  through  life, 
as  Baldwin  Brown,  in  his  ordination  charge, 
advised  me  to  do.  And  so  he  became  ^  The 
Great-heart  of  New  Guinea,'  as  Robert  Louis 
Stevenson  called  him." 

"  He  was  a  Christian  of  the  robust,  healthy 
type,"  writes  his  associate,  Mr.  Lawes,  "  with 
instinctive  hatred  of  all  cant  and  sham.  A 
man  of  great  faith,  mighty  in  prayer  and  full 
of  the  love  of  Christ.  He  realized  to  a  greater 
degree  than  most  men  what  it  is  to  live  in 
Christ,  and  to  him  His  presence  was  very  real 
and  true  and  constant.  And  this  spiritual 
povv^er  was  the  secret  of  his  wonderful  in- 
fluence over  men,  and  of  his  great  success  as 


lOO      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

a  missionary :  by  it  ^  he  being  dead,  yet  speak- 
eth.'  The  memory  of  his  Christ  Hfe  in  its 
consecration  and  unselfishness,  its  large-heart- 
edness,  its  childlike  faith,  its  communion  with 
God,  its  unwearied  service,  and  in  its  bright 
hopefulness  is  the  rich  legacy  he  has  left  to 
us  in  New  Guinea,  and  to  all  his  missionary 
brethren  wherever  his  name  and  fame  may 
come." 


VII 

TWO  SHORT   GREAT  LIVES  OF 
FIDELITY 

IN  the  fall  of  1905  there  died  at  Engle- 
wood,  New  Jersey,  within  a  few  weeks  of 
one  another,  two  members  of  the  class  of 
190 1  of  Princeton  University.  Each  died 
after  a  short  and  severe  illness,  and  only  a  few 
weeks  after  his  marriage,  and  each  on  the 
threshold  of  what  gave  promise  of  being  a 
specially  glorious  life  of  faithful  work  and 
large  usefulness. 

One  was  John  Leete  Rogers,  who  was  born 
in  New  Britain,  Connecticut,  June  11,  1880. 
There  he  spent  his  boyhood,  and  there  he  joined 
the  South  Congregational  Church,  when  he 
was  twelve  years  old.  He  entered  Princeton 
in  the  autumn  of  1897,  and  from  the  first  day 
to  the  last  he  walked  in  honour,  and  purity, 
and  strength.  He  took  high  rank  as  a  scholar. 
He  displayed  such  rare  executive  gifts  that 
the  most  responsible  duties  of  large  organiza- 
tions w^ere  laid  upon  him,  and  he   followed 

lOI 


I02      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

openly  and  courageously  the  Saviour  whom  as 
a  little  boy  he  had  confessed  before  men. 

**  John  was  one  of  the  very  best  we  had  in 
every  w^ay,"  says  the  secretary  of  the  class; 
"  and  no  one  was  held  in  higher  regard  by  the 
class  as  a  whole.  Every  one  knew  him  as  a 
fine,  pure,  strong,  able  man,  whose  life  always 
measured  up  to  his  Christian  profession.  Per- 
sonally, I  have  never  known  a  man  who  so 
successfully  exemplified  in  his  everyday  life 
the  principles  and  the  ideals  for  which  he 
stood.  Always  interested  in  and  pushing  the 
best  things  with  all  his  strength,  he  came 
gradually  stronger  and  stronger  before  his  as- 
sociates, until,  as  you  know,  after  graduation, 
it  was  John  that  we  turned  to  in  any  class  af- 
fairs that  we  wanted  attended  to  with  care  and 
conscientiousness.  From  the  first,  a  thor- 
oughly Christian  gentleman,  he  gradu- 
ally showed  us  all,  that  we  could  hold  our 
principles  and  still  retain  the  regard  of  our 
fellow-men,  that  it  was  better  to  be  right  than 
merely  popular;  and  by  this  attitude  he  gained 
the  highest  degree  of  popularity." 

After  graduation  from  college,  he  entered 
the  office  of  the  American  Locomotive  Com- 
pany. He  bore  himself  there  also  as  a  Chris- 
tian man  holding  Christian  principles,  and 
fearlessly  discharging  Christian  duties.  The 
comptroller  of  the  company  wrote  of  him: 


iTwo  Short  Great  Lives  of  Fidelity    103 

"  It  is  a  pleasure  to  write  of  the  remarkable 
influence  exerted  by  John  Rogers  during  his 
brief  business  life  of  four  years.  He  was  in 
my  employ  for  about  two  years  and  a  half. 
With  him  were  about  sixty  other  men;  some 
of  them  older  and  of  longer  business  experi- 
ence, and  some  younger.  Quite  a  number 
were  college  men  from  Princeton,  Yale,  Will- 
iams, Dartmouth,  and  a  number  of  other  col- 
leges. Quite  a  few  were  not  collegians,  and 
some  were  fellows  from  country  homes,  board- 
ing in  and  about  New  York  City. 

''  When  the  death  of  John  Rogers  was  an- 
nounced in  my  office  the  effect  was  simply  stun- 
ning— our  men  were  overwhelmed.  We  all 
felt  as  though  a  personal  calamity  had  be- 
fallen us.  Man  after  man  came  forward, 
either  to  me  or  to  my  assistant,  and  told  what 
his  association  with  John  Rogers  had  meant 
to  him. 

''  One  of  my  leading  men  said  that  John 
came  as  near  to  furnishing  a  pattern  and  an 
ideal  as  any  man  he  had  ever  met;  another 
said  with  broken  voice,  '  You  never  could  be 
near  John  Rogers  for  any  length  of  time  with- 
out feeling  like  a  better  man.'  Several  told 
us  that  he  had  been  the  means  of  considerable 
change  in  their  personal  habits.  One  young 
man  said :  '  I  either  had  to  give  up  swearing 
and  drinking  and  other  bad  habits,  or  else  get 
out  of  the  office.  Even  though  he  did  not 
say  much  about  it,  a  fellow  simply  could  not 
associate  with  John  Rogers  in  close  contact 
and  keep  up  evil  practices.'     Several  have  said 


I04      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

to  me  that  it  was  impossible  not  to  feel  a  dis- 
tinct impulse  toward  better  things  when  one 
lived  and  worked  with  John,  *  because  he  had 
such  an  inbred  contempt  for  anything  that 
was  crooked  or  dirty.'  " 

Upon  going  to  New  York,  John  Rogers  at 
once  identified  himself  with  the  work  of  the 
Church.  There  is  a  leakage  in  the  Christian 
life  of  our  land  between  college  and  business 
life.  Men  who  have  been  active  in  Christian 
work  in  college  days  drop  out  when  they  enter 
business,  but  John  Rogers  was  not  that  kind. 
He  joined  the  Fifth  Avenue  Church,  and  he 
joined  as  a  worker.  He  became  president  of 
the  Young  People's  Association  and  took  up 
work  among  the  boys  on  the  East  Side,  nor 
was  it  perfunctory  work.  He  took  a  real  in- 
terest in  the  boys,  following  them  up  outside, 
and  helping  them  to  rise  to  higher  lives. 

From  the  American  Locomotive  Com- 
pany, he  went  to  a  firm  of  bankers  and  brokers 
well  known  in  the  city.  Flis  work  was  so  ex- 
ceptionally faithful  and  efficient  that  he  was 
rapidly  advancing  to  a  position  of  great  re- 
sponsibility and  influence  when  he  laid  down 
all  his  work  here  and  took  up  higher  work  in 
the  land  where  work  is  no  more  laid  down. 
He  had  married  and  gone  to  Englewood  to  set 
up  his  home;  everything  was  perfect — love  and 


Two  Short  Great  Lives  of  Fidelity    105 

usefulness,  friends  and  work  were  filling  his 
life  with  the  best  and  highest  things — and  then 
came  the  swift,  tragic  end. 

"  It  was  a  divine  going  home,"  said  his 
former  pastor.  Dr.  Davis,  of  New  Britain. 
''  Prayer  was  its  spirit,  and  happiness  was  its 
w^atchword.  It  was  all  as  fearless  as  the  act 
by  w^hich  a  child  would  follow  its  father  out 
for  a  walk  together  in  the  spring  woods  and 
the  May  sunshine.  Truly  the  great  preacher 
was  right  when  he  said  that  the  proof  of  the 
faith  of  Christ  was  the  way  in  which  those 
who  held  it  passed  onward  into  the  silent  land. 
This  is  the  glory  and  power  of  the  modern 
saint.  He  lives  in  the  world  and  in  the  very 
midst  of  men;  but  his  spirit  keeps  its  watch 
with  Christ  ofttimes  on  the  mountains  of  devo- 
tion. The  words  keep  coming  back  to  me  as 
I  recall  what  has  been  told  of  the  room  where 
this  brave  young  knight  of  Christ  won  his  last 
battle.  '  Pray  '  and  '  Be  happy.'  Communion 
and  joy !  Do  not  these  gather  up  the  mightiest 
forces  and  richest  experiences  of  our  spiritual 
life,  after  all?  Thank  God  for  that  last  mes- 
sage from  his  lips." 

This  picture  is  no  unreal  picture  of  an 
imagined  life.  What  John  Rogers  appears  to 
have  been,  he  was.  His  college  classmates 
were  not  deceived  about  him,  and  a  committee 
of  the  class  testified : 


io6      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

''  For  the  second  time  in  four  months  the 
Class  of  'oi  mourns  the  loss  of  one  of  its 
strongest  and  ablest  men.  John  Rogers  rep- 
resented from  every  standpoint  the  best  that 
the  class  possessed.  In  him  were  united  the 
qualities  of  strength  and  purity,  coupled  with 
great  natural  ability,  in  a  degree  and  to  an  ex- 
tent rarely  existing  in  any  one  person.  His 
strong  principles,  high  ideals,  and  rugged  hon- 
esty bespoke  his  Puritan  ancestry  and  were  an 
ever-present  factor  in  his  daily  life.  His  love 
and  enthusiasm  for  his  university  and  his  class 
were  unbounded,  and  the  labour  he  performed 
in  countless  ways  on  behalf  of  each  can  never 
be  wholly  reckoned.  He  never  missed  a  class 
reunion,  and  frequently  sacrificed  other  per- 
sonal interests  in  order  to  attend,  even  though 
the  greater  part  of  his  time  on  such  occa- 
sions was  taken  up  by  labour  of  one  kind  or 
another  on  behalf  of  the  class.  His  faithful- 
ness and  reliability  rendered  him  constantly  in 
demand  for  service  of  every  character,  and 
each  task  was  invariably  performed  with  an 
ability  and  thoroughness  which  left  nothing  to 
be  desired.  The  class  mourns  him  as  one  of 
its  picked  men  whom  it  has  delighted  to  re- 
gard as  representative  and  whom,  least  of  all, 
it  could  afford  to  lose." 


Nor  could  the  world  afiford  to  lose  such  men, 
were  it  not  that  God  has  larger  use  for  them 
elsewhere. 

"  For  the  second  time,"  said  the  class  com- 


Two  Short  Great  Lives  of  Fidelity    107 

mittee,  regarding  John  Rogers'  death.  The 
first  time  was  only  four  months  before,  and 
the  other  man  was  Harold  Arthur  Watres,  the 
oldest  son  of  Colonel  Watres  of  Scranton, 
Pennsylvania.  He  was  born  in  Scranton 
March  23,  1879.  He  went  first  to  the  public 
schools  of  Scranton,  where  he  lived  as  a  boy 
his  high  and  irreproachable  life.  One  of  his 
classmates  in  those  days,  who  knew  the  boy 
better  than  did  most  of  his  other  friends,  spoke 
after  Harold's  death  of  the  schoolboy  years, 
and  of  what  he  had  been  in  them : 

"  It  is  a  long  time  since  Harold  Watres  and 
myself  were  sent  by  the  public  schools  of 
Scranton  to  a  neighboring  city  to  meet  the 
juvenile  orators  of  that  town  in  deadly  debate. 
We  occupied  the  same  seat  in  school,  and  we 
took  our  diplomas  together,  he  being  saluta- 
torian  of  my  class ;  and  from  that  day  even 
to  this  hour,  there  has  been  no  time  that  I  did 
not  enjoy  the  beneficent  influence  of  his  friend- 
ship and  good  will,  and  even  while  he  lay  dead 
in  Englewood,  there  came  to  my  desk  from  a 
distant  city,  a  letter  intrusting  to  me  a  legal 
task  on  the  recommendation  of  Harold 
Watres. 

"  It  requires  no  subtle  analysis  to  depict  the 
character  of  Harold  A.  Watres,  for  simplicity 
is  always  found  among  those  virtues  which 
make  a  man  really  great;  and  what,  even 
casual,  acquaintance  of  Harold  Watres  had 


io8      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

failed  to  note  that  the  golden  threads  of  hon- 
estry,  lo3^alty,  and  charity  were  woven  in  the 
woof  and  fibre  of  his  life?  He  deserved  no 
particular  credit  for  being  a  true  gentleman, 
because  it  was  natural  and  instinctive.  His 
every  act  was  clothed  Avith  a  sub-conscious 
grace  and  courtesy  that  became  the  average 
person's  initial  impression  of  him.  He  was  al- 
most too  gentle  and  reserved,  and  yet,  where 
a  principle  was  involved,  he  defended  it  with 
a  flash  and  fire  that  stood  out  lurid  against  his 
usually  calm  and  quiet  disposition.  I  very 
well  recall  his  spirited  opposition,  as  a  mere 
boy,  to  certain  partisan  doctrines  set  forth  in  a 
Political  Economy  then  in  use  in  the  Scranton 
High  School.  And  it  was  that  very  incident 
that  immediately  inspired  the  discussion  of  the 
subject  in  the  public  prints  of  this  city  and  re- 
sulted in  the  textbook  being  supplanted  by  a 
non-partisan  one.  It  was  then  that  I  learned 
that  the  gentle  hand  of  Harold  Watre?  could 
be  a  firm  and  heavy  one." 

From  his  earliest  childhood  he  was  a  Chris- 
tian boy  and  one  of  the  most  active  members 
of  a  boys'  missionary  society  In  the  Second 
Presbyterian  Church  of  Scranton.  The  leader 
of  this  band  loves  to  recall  the  impression  he 
made  when  he  first  came  as  a  winning,  high- 
minded  boy  with  a  "  power  of  thinking."  He 
was  one  of  the  kind  to  be  absolutely  relied 
upon. 


Two  Short  Great  Lives  of  Fidelity    109 

*'  To  the  spiritual  side  of  the  subject,"  writes 
she,  ''  his  nature,  with  rare  intuition,  strongly 
responded.  His  felicitous  utterance  and  his 
devout  spirit  united  to  make  his  prayer  for 
the  objects  of  the  organization  singularly  im- 
pressive, while  on  the  social  side  of  the  life 
of  the  Band — in  our  delightful  banquets,  for 
instance — his  exquisite  wit,  his  poetic  fancy, 
and  dramatic  power  were  simply  charming. 
With  all  his  gifts,  he  was  not  in  the  least  er- 
ratic, but  thoroughly  dependable,  and  from  his 
earliest  boyhood,  he  was  always  the  thought- 
ful, considerate  gentleman,  a  youthful  Bayard, 
without  fear  and  without  reproach." 

In  1897  he  went  to  Princeton  University,  in 
the  class  of  1901,  and  was  graduated  with 
honour.  In  college,  he  entered  enthusiastic- 
ally upon  all  its  interests.  He  was  president 
of  the  college  dramatic  association  known  as 
the  ''  Triangle  Club,"  and,  as  the  class  testified 
after  his  death,  he  was  one  of  its  best-beloved 
and  strongest  members. 

'*  He  combined  with  many  splendid  charac- 
teristics a  charm  of  personality  and  a  warmth 
of  interest  which  won  for  him  the  lasting  af- 
fection of  his  friends.  He  w^as  a  man  of 
strong  principles,  exemplary  habits,  and 
marked  ability.  Unfailingly  enthusiastic  in  all 
matters  affecting  the  class  and  the  university, 
he  was  ever  ready  to  perform  any  helpful 
service  with  characteristic  efficiency." 


no      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

After  graduation  from  college,  he  studied 
law  in  the  Universities  of  Pennsylvania  and 
Columbia,  and  travelled  abroad.  On  January 
4,  1904,  he  was  admitted  to  the  bar  of  Lacka- 
wanna County,  Pennsylvania,  and,  immedi- 
ately after,  offered  himself  also  for  admission 
to  practise  before  the  Superior  and  Supreme 
Courts.  One  of  the  older  members  of  the 
Lackawanna  bar  said  at  the  memorial  service 
after  Harold's  death: 

"  Being  a  member  of  the  examining  board 
at  the  time  Mr.  Watres  was  admitted  to  the 
bar,  I  happen  to  know  that  his  papers  at- 
tracted the  attention  of  the  committee  for  the 
clearness  with  which  he  stated  his  answers  to 
the  examination  cjuestions.  After  he  had 
been  admitted  to  the  local  bar  he  said  to  me 
that  he  did  not  desire  to  wait  for  two  years, 
the  time  prescribed,  before  he  was  admitted 
to  the  Supreme  Court,  and  asked  me  when  the 
State  Board  of  Examiners  met  for  the  next  ex- 
amination. I  told  him  it  was  within  ten  days, 
and  I  asked  him  if  he  had  made  any  immediate 
preparation  for  the  examination,  and  he  said 
he  had  not.  I  remarked  that  the  examination 
was  a  little  severe,  and  we  talked  the  matter 
over  in  a  general  way,  and  I  saw  that  he  was 
strong  in  his  desire  to  be  admitted  to  the  Su- 
preme Court.  While  he  realized  the  diffi- 
culty of  the  examination,  he  had  every  con- 
fidence in  his  ability  to  pass  it.     I  think  it  is 


Two  Short  Great  Lives  of  Fidelity     iii 

worthy  of  note  that  while  there  were  eight 
applicants  at  Wilkes  Barre  at  that  time,  for 
admission  to  the  Supreme  Court,  Harold 
Watres  was  the  only  one  who  successfully 
passed." 

The  strong,  upright  life,  so  full  of  prom- 
ise, so  needed  for  the  work  it  was  able  to  do, 
had  no  long  time  to  wait,  however.  On  Sep- 
tember i6,  1905,  he  passed  away.  None  but 
his  closest  friends  knew  of  the  grave  illness 
from  which  he  had  been  suffering.  No  word 
of  personal  sorrow  or  pain  passed  his  lips. 
With  quiet  and  joyful  courage  he  accepted 
God's  will  and  laid  down  his  work  here  for  his 
greater  work  above. 

Of  how  many  young  men  can  such  state- 
ments be  made  as  were  made  of  him  by  vari- 
ous men  at  the  memorial  meeting  of  the  Lacka- 
wanna bar  on  the  day  of  his  funeral? 

"  He  depended  upon  no  favourable  circum- 
stances; but,  like  many  other  of  our  young 
men,  he  was  one  of  those  who  are  willing  to 
burn  the  midnight  oil.  He  was  persuasive;  he 
was  persevering;  he  studied  with  method;  he 
studied  carefully;  and  when  he  appeared  be- 
fore the  Court  he  was  always  prepared.  His 
briefs  were  models  of  clearness  and  fulness, 
and  I  know  that  I  express  the  united  admira- 
tion of  the  bench  when  I  say  that  certainly 
there  was  no  young  man  the  superior  of  Har- 


112      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

old  A.  Watres  at  the  bar,  when  we  consider  the 
faithfulness  with  which  he  engaged  in  the 
arduous  duties  of  his  profession. 

"  He  was  in  every  relation  of  life  a  true 
Christian  gentleman.  He  had  a  cast  of  mind 
eminently  practical,  but  accurate  with  conclu- 
sions, and  had  he  lived,  I  am  sure  he  would 
have  taken  high  rank  in  the  legal  fraternity 
of  the  Commonwealth.  Quiet  and  unobtru- 
sive in  his  manner,  exceedingly  affectionate, 
he  was,  indeed,  a  most  loyal  friend. 

"  He  presumed  nothing  upon  the  prestige  of 
his  distinguished  father's  official  and  business 
career,  but  sought  only  to  win  success  upon  his 
own  merits.  Kind,  considerate,  and  unassum- 
ing, he  was  universally  liked  and  respected. 

''  Harold  Watres  was  a  man  of  lofty  ideals, 
of  great  courage,  and  absolute  integrity. 
When  he  came  into  our  office  there  was  no  part 
of  the  work  which  was  disdained  by  him ;  the 
examination  of  titles  and  the  most  minute 
details  received  his  most  careful  attention,  and 
in  everything  he  undertook  he  w^as  earnest, 
he  was  honest,  and  he  was  true. 

"  His  well-trained  mind,  upright  character, 
unfailing  courtesy,  and  devotion  to  his  pro- 
fession, all  bespoke  for  him  the  eminent  posi- 
tion which  he  might  have  commanded  had  his 
life  been  spared." 


"  Personally,"  said  the  secretary  of  his  col- 
lege class,  ''  I  have  never  known  a  cleaner, 
purer,  more  lovable  friend." 


Two  Short  Great  Lives  of  Fidelity     113 

Why  are  young  men  so  fooHsh  that  often 
everything  else  is  worth  more  to  them  than 
such  characters  as  these  two  men  possessed? 
Why  will  they  acquire  weak  hahits  and  do 
unworthy  things  when  men  can  be  such  men 
as  Harold  Watres  and  John  Rogers  if  they 
will? 


VIII 
WALLACE  SOMERVILLE  FARIS 

IN  1907  a  great  famine  in  the  province 
of  Kiang-An  in  China  brought  suffering 
and  death  to  thousands  of  Chinese  coun- 
try people.  Floods  had  destroyed  the  crops, 
and,  in  many  cases,  the  homes  of  the  people. 
Hundreds  of  thousands  fled  southward  or 
gathered  about  cities  like  Tsing-kiang-fu  and, 
crowded  together  outside  the  city  walls, 
awaited  the  slow  but  inevitable  end.  Chris- 
tendom, as  always,  as  soon  as  the  facts  were 
known,  poured  out  great  sums  for  relief  of 
the  starving.  The  only  available  and  capable 
distributors  of  the  relief  were  the  missionaries, 
and  from  North  and  South  men  offered  them- 
selves for  the  work.  Among  those  who  came 
to  the  famine  relief  were  the  Rev.  John  Reese 
Jones,  a  young  missionary  from  Nanking,  and 
the  Rev.  Wallace  S.  Paris,  who  had  been  in 
China  eleven  years,  from  Ihsien  station,  in 
the  province  of  Shantung,  and  both  of  these 

went  home  from  the  work  of  relief  distribu- 

114 


Wallace  Somerville  Paris  115 

tion  with  sicknesses  contracted  in  the  work, 
from  which  they  did  not  recover.  Like  other 
missionaries  before  them  in  China  and  other 
lands,  they  quietly  and  uncomplainingly  laid 
down  their  lives  in  the  unadvertised  perform- 
ance of  their  duty. 

Wallace  Somerville  Paris  was  born  in  Chi- 
cago, May  15,  1869.  He  was  a  frail  and  del- 
icate baby,  but  a  summer  spent  on  an  uncle's 
farm,  named  Sunnyside,  in  Illinois,  brought 
strength  and  vigour  to  him.  Later  he  came 
back  to  Sunnyside,  when  he  was  nine  years 
old. 

"  The  sterling  traits  of  character  which  so 
distinguished  his  youth  and  manhood,"  says 
his  uncle,  "  were  noticeable  then.  He  was  not 
brilliant  as  a  student,  and  he  had  to  dig  for 
what  he  got.  I  remember  how  faithful  and 
painstaking  he  was  in  his  studies,  and  how 
honest  in  his  recitations.  He  was  just  as 
faithful  and  honest  in  doing  the  homely  every- 
day tasks  about  the  house.  It  was  a  matter 
of  conscience  with  him  to  '  do  with  all  his 
might  whatsoever  his  hands  found  to  do.'  He 
didn't  shirk  and  he  didn't  sulk,  when  things 
did  not  go  his  way.  I  could  always  rely  upon 
him.  He  was  by  no  means  a  '  goody  good  ' 
boy.  He  often  got  into  boyish  scrapes,  and 
he  was  duly  and  promptly  punished  therefor 
by  his  grandmother.  But  he  never  lied  to 
save  himself.     I  was  in  The  Talk  office  when 


ii6      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

Wallace  began  work  there  first  as  '  Devi),'  and 
later  while  he  was  learning  to  set  type.  I 
saw  him  almost  every  day,  and  his  work  was 
characterized  by  the  faithfulness  of  his  earlier 
years.  He  did  it  with  all  his  might.  As  I 
think  of  him  at  that  time,  the  thing  that  im- 
presses me  most  is  his  loyalty  to  his  parents 
and  obedience  to  their  commands.  At  that 
age  many  boys  think  it  manly  to  disobey  now 
and  then.  Neither  the  example  nor  the  per- 
suasion nor  the  jibes  of  playmates  moved  Wal- 
lace to  disobedience.  If,  when  he  went  to  a 
party,  his  father  told  him  he  must  start  home 
at  nine  o'clock,  he  started  at  that  hour,  what- 
ever happened.  .  .  .  He  had  good  red  blood 
in  his  veins,  and  a  goodly  stock  of  strong  pas- 
sions, but  these  last  he  learned  to  control  in 
his  youth.  I  have  known  many  boys,  but  it 
has  never  been  my  privilege  to  know  one  so 
clean  and  pure  and  courageous  as  Wallace. 
The  helpful  things  in  his  life  for  young  peo- 
ple are,  it  seems  to  me,  his  truthfulness,  faith- 
fulness, helpfulness,  and  obedience.  This  is 
stating  it  baldly  and  crudely.  You  ask  me  to 
mention  incidents  in  his  life.  I  cannot  do  it. 
I  wish  I  could.  But  the  truth  is,  that  we  who 
knew  him  intimately  early  learned  to  expect 
good  things  of  Wallace,  and  the  incidents  that 
brought  out  his  good  qualities  were  unnoted. 
Like  the  everyday  common  mercies  of  God,  we 
accepted  them  as  a  matter  of  course." 

As  a  boy  he  taught  himself  the  lesson  of 
holding  his  speech.     He  w^as  always  perfectly 


Wallace  Somerville  Paris  117 

straightforward  and  outspoken  when  it  was 
his  duty  to  speak,  but  he  would  say  nothing, 
even  as  a  boy,  to  annoy  others  or  hurt  their 
feelings.  He  preferred  to  say  what  would  en- 
courage and  cheer. 

''  All  who  knew  of  his  life — men,  women, 
and  children — loved  him.  The  common  im- 
pression of  him  was  voiced  one  day  by  an  old 
lady,  who,  seeing  him  go  by,  said  to  a  friend, 
*  Behold  an  Israelite,  indeed,  in  whom  is  no 
guile ! '  '  Make  every  allowance  for  the  other 
fellow,  and  none  at  all  for  yourself,'  was  the 
advice  given  by  him  in  after  years  to  a  friend 
who  was  resenting  a  slight  put  upon  him  by 
another.  Thus,  unwittingly,  he  put  into 
words  what  had  been  from  iDoyhood  days  one 
of  the  moving  principles  of  his  life." 

In  the  academ}^,  in  college,  and  in  seminary 
he  was  an  unobtrusive  leader  in  religious  work. 
At  fifteen  he  was  instrumental  in  organizing 
the  Young  Men's  Christian  Association  at 
Union  Academy,  Anna,  Illinois,  and  if  it  had 
not  been  for  his  inspiring  faithfulness,  the 
society  could  not  have  been  kept  alive.  Soon 
after,  in  the  home  church,  the  Christian  En- 
deavour Society  was  organized,  of  which  he 
was  a  charter  member.  His  work  in  this  so- 
ciety, backed  by  his  life,  is  a  tradition  handed 
down  to  those  who  to-day  make  up  the  society. 
In  the  Sunday-school  he  was  a  teacher  at  six- 


Ii8      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

teen.  It  was  his  habit  to  visit  his  pupils,  urg- 
ing them  to  become  Christians.  While  at  col- 
lege and  seminary,  and  after  he  went  to  China, 
he  wrote  letters  to  those  who  had  not  yet 
united  with  the  Church,  continuing  the  pleas 
that  were  blessed  to  the  salvation  of  a  number 
of  them. 

The  Rev.  J.  W.  Stephens,  of  Park  College, 
co-principal  of  Union  Academy,  which  Wal- 
lace attended  from  1883  to  1888,  writes  his 
impression  of  the  boy  at  that  time : 

'*  At  this  period  of  his  life,  he  was  not 
reckoned  either  by  his  father  or  by  myself  as 
a  brilliant  boy.  He  was  one  of  those  boys 
whose  talents  and  abilities  mature  rather  late 
in  life.  He  was  known  as  an  industrious, 
plodding,  faithful  student,  going  steadily  along 
from  day  to  day,  whether  he  succeeded  or  not. 
He  may  have  been  discouraged,  but  he  never 
stopped  or  complained.  No  doubt,  he  noticed 
that  some  of  his  classmates  surpassed  him,  but 
he  didn't  blame  his  teachers  for  that.  He  just 
went  on  faithfully  plodding.  He  was  a  gen- 
tleman in  school,  on  the  playground,  street — 
everywhere  and  always — never  rude  or  cross  or 
forgetful,  though  possessed  of  and  properly 
maintaining  a  correct  sense  of  his  own  per- 
sonal dignity  and  knowledge  of  his  rights. 
His  face  and  manner  were  kind,  conciliator}^, 
and  gracious.  As  a  Christian,  he  understood 
that  it  was  a  part  of  his  business  to  help  build 


Wallace  Somerville  Faris  119 

up  the  Kingdom  where  he  then  was,  that  is, 
in  school,  among  his  classmates  and  other  com- 
panions. He  expected  to  be  a  preacher,  but  he 
didn't  put  off  the  time  of  active  labours  to 
some  remote  future  time.  In  ways  utterly  un- 
obtrusive, he  finally  interested  young  men  of 
greater  natural  ability  and  power  than  he  then 
possessed  in  Y.M.C.A.  work,  and  then  on  into 
the  Christian  life.  I  remember  being  dis- 
tinctly surprised  at  some  of  these  results,  not 
having  been  aware  of  the  means  used.  He 
was  certainly  a  peculiar  example  of  reserve, 
of  manliness,  of  gravity,  while  still  young.  He 
never  played  as  much  as  I  should  have  liked. 
He  differed  decidedly  from  most  boys  in  that 
particular.  Nevertheless,  he  was  jolly,  and 
very  companionable,  and  friendly  to  a  degree. 
Lastly,  I  set  down  this  as  a  distinguishing 
feature  of  his  life,  at  that  period,  and  an  im- 
pressive lesson  to  all  boys  and  girls,  men  and 
women:  He  lived  out  in  the  highly  attractive 
and  influential  fashion  the  simple  Christian 
life — cheerful,  polite,  industrious,  helpful, 
sympathetic,  unobtrusive.  He  was  a  centre 
of  attraction,  but  he  blew  no  horns.  Time 
and  patience  were  given  a  chance  to  get  in 
their  work.  If  he  never  had  become  a 
preacher  at  home  or  abroad,  in  any  walk  of 
life,  he  would  have  persuaded  boys  and  girls 
and  people  of  any  age  or  position  to  follow 
him  to  Christ.     So  can  we  all." 

Wallace  took  the  first  part  of  his  college 
course  at  Lake  Forest  College,  near  Chicago. 


I20      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

"  I  always  think  of  him  as  a  boy  who  com- 
manded the  respect  and  regard  of  everybody," 
wrote  Professor  John  J.  Halsey  of  his  early 
college  days.  *'  His  purpose  was  high  and 
noble,  his  work  in  Lake  Forest  was  conscien- 
tious and  of  a  high  grade,  and  he  won  my  re- 
gard and  esteem  as  few  boys  do.  •  He  seemed 
a  consecrated  spirit  from  the  very  first."  He 
made  no  noise  or  bluster,  but  did  all  things 
with  steady  and  dependable  strength.  *'  As  I 
knew  Wallace  at  Lake  Forest,"  wrote  a  class- 
mate, ''  the  greatest  impression  of  his  char- 
acter upon  me  was  through  his  quiet  industry. 
Whether  it  was  studying  Greek  or  whatever  it 
might  be,  there  was,  as  I  remember  him,  a 
quiet  sort  of  reserve  that  w^as  yet  stirring  al- 
w^ays  below  the  surface."  For  the  last  two 
years  of  his  college  course  Wallace  went  to 
Leland  Stanford,  Jr.,  University.  It  was  at 
the  very  beginning  of  the  university's  ex- 
istence. A  member  of  the  same  fraternity 
with  him  there  writes  of  the  kind  of  man  he 
showed  himself  to  be: 

"  This  procrastination  in  letter  writing  of 
which  I  am  guilty,  recalls,  by  contrast,  one  of 
Wallace's  characteristics,  i.e.,  his  faithfulness 
to  duty  and  to  his  friends.  Wallace  met  every 
engagement,  and  did  his  full  duty  on  time. 
In  our  Fraternity,  Phi  Delta  Theta,  he  was 


Wallace  Somerville  Paris  121 

frequently  assigned  special  missions,  and  never 
failed  to  make  a  satisfactory  report  at  the  ap- 
pointed time.  His  friends  frequently  appealed 
to  him  for  help  or  advice.  His  own  v^ork  was 
immediately  set  aside,  until  the  friend  could  be 
cared  for.  He  was  faithful  in  school-day  af- 
fairs, small  wonder  that  he  later  met  larger  re- 
sponsibilities. My  associations  with  Wallace 
were  in  the  home,  the  Chapter  house,  and  not 
in  the  classroom,  so  I  testify  to  his  manhood, 
not  to  his  scholarship,  which,  however,  I  have 
reason  to  believe  was  of  a  very  high  order. 
The  two  years  that  Wallace  attended  Leland 
Stanford,  Jr.,  University,  he  having  entered 
as  an  upper  classman,  were  the  first  two  years 
of  the  institution's  existence,  and  also  the  first 
two  years  of  our  Fraternity's  chapter-house 
experience.  Hence  the}^  were  years  of  or- 
ganizing and  of  precedent  setting.  Wallace 
was  a  power  for  good  in  the  different  councils 
and  committees.  His  sanity,  his  conservatism, 
and  his  high  ideals  prevented  many  a  childish 
error.  Most  of  his  co-labourers  were  im- 
petuous, all-wise,  all-powerful  freshmen  and 
sophomores  (as  the  lower  classes  in  a  brand- 
new  college  were  naturally  the  larger),  thus 
making  his  task  more  trying;  but  amid  the 
trials  of  construction  under  such  conditions, 
Wallace  was  never  known  to  have  lost  his 
equipoise,  never  swerved  from  the  right  course 
as  he  saw  it,  but  accepted  temporary  defeat 
with  the  same  grace  that  he  accepted  victory, 
apparently  believing  that  all  would  be  well  in 
the  end.     He  was  one  of  the  chief  organizers 


122      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

of  the  Christian  Association  at  Stanford,  and 
was  probably  the  most  faithful  and  consistent 
member,  devoting  to  the  association  and  its 
branches  almost  as  much  time  and  attention  as 
to  his  classroom  work. 

"  He  lived  his  Christianity.  His  Fraternity 
brothers  who  saw  him  in  his  work  and  in  his 
recreation,  who  knew  him  when  he  was  tired 
and  worn  as  well  as  when  refreshed  and  in 
light  spirits,  his  Fraternity  brothers  who 
tempted  him,  who  joked  him,  who  ate 
and  slept  with  him,  these  men  who  knew 
him  in  sickness  and  in  health,  could 
find  no  fault  in  his  Christianity,  though 
some  of  them  were  inclined  to  scoff,  and 
hence  watched  carefully.  He  was  never  found 
wanting.  His  consistency  gave  many  of  his 
well-meaning  but  weaker  friends  unpleasant 
experiences  with  their  conscience,  but  Wal- 
lace never  seemed  conscious  of  his  virtues, 
and  never  assumed  the  '  holier  than  thou  '  atti- 
tude. Wallace  Faris  was  respected  and  loved 
by  every  Stanford  man  who  knew  him.  Many 
a  life  was  made  more  useful  and  better  be- 
cause of  his  influence." 

Wallace  took  his  theological  course  at 
Princeton  Theological  Seminary,  where  he 
was  graduated  in  1896,  offering  himself  at 
once  to  the  Presbyterian  Board  of  Foreign 
Missions  for  appointment  as  a  missionary  to 
Mexico,  South  America,  or  China.  ''  In  this 
order/'  he  wrote.     "  However,  I  stand  ready 


Wallace  Somerville  Paris  123 

to  go  to  any  field  to  which  the  Board  may  see 
fit  to  assign  me." 

"  I  realize  the  pressing  needs  of  the  foreign 
field,"  he  said  in  explanation  of  his  motive  for 
going,  "  and  appreciate  the  fact  that  many  of 
those  who  would  go  are  unavoidably  detained ; 
whereas,  so  far  as  I  now  see,  there  is  no  such 
hindrance  in  my  case.  It,  therefore,  seems  to 
be  my  duty  to  offer  myself  for  this  work.  I 
am  not  a  ready  extemporaneous  speaker,  nor 
am  I  gifted  in  the  acquisition  of  a  strange  lan- 
guage, but  I  habitually  have  robust  health,  and 
I  am  not  averse  to  hard  work." 

In  writing  to  the  Board  regarding  his  quali- 
fications, his  father  said:  ''  I  have  met  few  if 
any  others  who  so  readily  adapt  themselves  to 
assigned  tasks."  ''  He  is  a  very  uncommon 
young  man,"  wrote  one  of  his  seminary  pro- 
fessors. "  He  is  an  indefatigable  worker,  a 
thorough  scholar,  a  great  favourite  with  the 
students,  a  man  of  fine  tact  and  good  ex- 
ecutive ability,  and  one  who  has  to  no  un- 
usual degree  the  gift  of  getting  along  with 
people  and  doing  his  work  without  friction." 
This  was  the  enthusiastic  way  of  putting  it. 
Another  professor  wrote  more  quietly :  *'  He 
has  shown  all  good  fidelity,  and  while  not  the 
leading  man  of  his  class  in  scholarship,  is  well 
above  the  average.     He  is  well  balanced,  his 


124      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

piety  and  learning  being  both  of  good  order. 
He  commands  the  respect  of  his  classmates." 
The  Board  at  once  appointed  him,  rejoiced 
to  get  so  good  and  humble  and  skilled  a  man, 
and  he  sailed  with  his  wife  for  China  in  the 
fall  of  1896,  arriving  in  the  province  of  Shan- 
tung in  November. 

''  It  fell  to  my  lot,"  wrote  the  Rev.  W.  P. 
Chalfant  of  Ichowfu,  China,  '*  to  act  as  escort 
to  him  and  his  wife  when  they  arrived  in  Shan- 
tung in  November,  1896.  I  well  remember 
when  I  first  saw  them  at  the  small  city  of  T'ai 
Erh  Chwang,  the  nearest  point  on  the  Grand 
Canal  to  Ichowfu.  Up  to  that  point  they  had 
been  escorted  by  Mr.  R.  H.  Bent  and  his  wife. 
It  was  a  dismal,  cold,  rainy  day  when  we  set 
foot  upon  the  slimy  steps  of  the  stone  stairway 
at  the  landing,  and,  running  the  gauntlet  of 
the  curious  gazers  upon  the  street,  took  refuge 
in  a  semi- foreign  house  that  had  recently  been 
deserted  by  a  sister  Mission.  We  had  sixty 
miles  to  traverse,  and  our  means  of  travel  was 
the  two-man  barrow.  Having  loaded  the  bar- 
rows, and  disposed  the  newcomers  one  upon 
each  side  of  their  vehicle,  we  set  out  upon  the 
exceedingly  muddy  pathway  which  stands  for 
a  road.  We  were  nearly  all  that  day  making 
ten  miles,  and  then  we  brought  up  in  what  I 
can  truthfully  say  was  about  the  worst  inn  I 
have  ever  attempted  to  put  up  in.  The  full 
force  of  that  statement  can  only  be  felt  by 
those  who  know  southern  Shantung.     A  large 


Wallace  Somerville  Faris  125 

part  of  the  small  court  was  an  open  cesspool, 
and  the  remainder  was  an  expanse  of  black 
mud  mixed  with  manure.  The  room  had  no 
door,  and  the  floor  was  damp,  not  to  say  wet, 
earth.  There  was  not  a  vestige  of  chair,  table, 
bed,  or  any  other  article  of  native  furniture. 
In  a  word,  it  was,  to  use  the  picturesque  lan- 
guage of  the  day,  '  the  limit.'  In  that  hovel 
I  was  compelled  to  ask  this  young  gentleman 
and  lady,  fresh  from  the  amenities  of  home 
life,  and  used  only  to  the  comparative  com- 
forts of  boat  travel,  to  spend  the  night.  I  was 
struck,  then,  with  a  salient  characteristic  of 
Mr.  Faris's  character,  namely,  with  his  capacity 
to  endure  hardship  without  losing  his  equa- 
nimity. He  seems  to  have  early  learned  the 
lesson  to  be  content  with  '  whatever  lot '  fell 
to  him.  On  the  second  day,  as  we  were  toiling 
along  through  the  mud,  I  saw  that  Mrs.  Faris 
was  nervous  lest  the  barrow,  balanced  upon  its 
single  wheel,  should  upset.  I  hastened  to  as- 
sure her  that  such  an  accident  never  happened, 
and  that  she  could  rest  easy  upon  that  point. 
Not  long  after  I  heard  a  noise  behind  me,  and 
turned  just  in  time  to  see  my  unfortunate 
guests  hurled  into  the  mud  from  the  over- 
turned barrow !  " 

Though  hardships  came,  they  were  mere 
irrelevant  details  in  his  eyes. 

"  When  Wallace  wrote  from  China,"  says 
his  brother,  '*  we  looked  in  vain  for  references 
to    hardship.     Others    might   write    of    those 


126      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

things — he  said  nothing.  A  reader  of  his  let- 
ters would  infer  that  China  was  the  most  de- 
lightful place  of  residence  in  the  world.  We 
wrote  questions,  asking  of  some  of  the  hard 
conditions  of  which  we  had  heard;  the  ques- 
tions remained  unanswered.  When  he  was  at 
home  on  furlough  we  tried  again.  Invariably, 
however,  he  would  turn  the  conversation  as 
soon  as  possible,  giving  us  no  satisfaction  as  to 
the  subject  of  inquiry.  But  we  had  the  greater 
satisfaction  of  seeing  that  he  was  so  devoted  to 
his  Master's  service  that  he  was  blind  to  the 
petty  difficulties  incident  to  his  life  of  a  mis- 
sionary in  a  city  far  from  the  railway  or  the 
canal." 

For  the  next  eight  years  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Faris 
worked  at  Ichowfu,  but  not  uninterruptedly. 
At  the  time  he  reached  China  the  Boxer  storm 
was  already  gathering,  and  in  1900  it  broke  in 
all  its  fury.  The  Farises  and  all  the  other 
missionaries  in  Shantung  were  ordered  out  by 
the  Consul-General  at  Chef 00.  The  ports 
were  crowded  with  the  refugees,  and  Wallace 
and  his  wife  went  over  to  Japan,  until  the 
storm  was  past.  As  soon  as  possible  after  the 
reestablishment  of  order,  they  returned  to 
Ichowfu,  arriving  May  4,  1901.  ''The  en- 
tire responsibility  of  the  work  of  the  station, 
and  that  at  a  time  when  everything  was  seeth- 
ing with  excitement  and  change,  fell  upon  the 
shoulders  of  Mr.   Faris.     He  bore  up  nobly 


Wallace  Somerville  Paris  127 

under  it,  and  the  wisdom  and  thoroughness 
with  which  he  dealt  with  the  trying  situation 
are  in  evidence  to-day.  In  fact,  it  was  the 
ability  with  which  he  met  that  situation  that 
pointed  him  out  as  the  logical  candidate  for 
the  position  as  '  leader '  in  the  new  station  at 
Ihsien." 

Before  these  new  responsibilities  came,  how- 
ever, he  returned  for  a  year's  furlough  in 
America,  coming  by  way  of  Europe,  and 
reaching  New  York  in  January.  While  at 
home  the  plans  for  opening  the  new  station  at 
Ihsien  were  developed,  and  new  men  were 
picked  out  to  be  associated  with  him  in  it. 
Meanwhile,  however,  the  massacre  at  Lien 
Chow,  in  South  China,  had  alarmed  many 
friends  at  home,  and  no  one  could  be  sure  of 
what  the  future  would  bring  forth.  In  his 
cautious  way  he  was  seriously  thoughtful  as 
to  his  duty. 

"  What  do  you  think  about  the  present 
agitation  in  China  ?  "  he  wrote  to  the  Board. 
**  As  far  as  I  myself  am  concerned,  it  makes 
little  difference  whether  China  is  disturbed 
or  not,  whether  she  is  anxious  to  kill  all  for- 
eigners or  not;  my  work  is  there,  and  I  am 
anxious  to  get  back  to  it  as  soon  as  possible. 
At  the  same  time,  I  do  not  like  to  take  Mrs. 
Faris  into  a  dangerous  country,  although  she 
is  not  alone  willing,  but  also  anxious  to  go  at 


128      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

once.  However,  there  is  the  question  of  our 
relatives — is  it  fair  to  them  to  have  us  go 
toward  what  they  consider  as  the  gravest 
danger  ?  It  is  for  this  reason  especially  that  I 
should  like  to  know  your  own  opinion  of  the 
situation.  Does  the  Board  deem  it  grave 
enough  to  make  it  go  slow  about  any  exten- 
sion of  existing  work?  As  you  may  imagine, 
I  have  not  spoken  of  this  without  first  think- 
ing of  it  much  and  praying  over  it.  But  the 
accounts  which  come  to  us  daily  are  so  dis- 
quieting that  I  have  felt  impelled  at  last  to 
write  you  in  this  strain." 

In  less  than  three  weeks,  however,  he  wrote 
of  his  purpose  to  go  back  at  once  to  China, 
leaving  Mrs.  Faris,  whose  mother  was  ill,  to 
follow  a  little  later.  "  It  is  not  easy,"  he 
added,  *'  for  either  one  of  us  to  do  as  I  have 
indicated  we  are  doing.  But  God  never  re- 
quires anything  of  us  for  which  He  does  not 
give  the  strength." 

On  April  4  he  reached  Ichowfu. 

"  In  China,"  he  wrote,  "  things  seem  much 
as  when  Mrs.  Faris  and  I  left  eighteen  months 
ago.  There  has  been  comparatively  little 
change  in  the  things  which  belong  to  the 
church.  But  as  regards  temporal  things,  the 
case  is  different.  China  is  truly  awakening 
from  the  sleep  of  ages.  She  is  adopting  for- 
eign things  with  a  rapidity  that  makes  one's 
head  swim.     Her  haste  in  this  matter  is,  per- 


Wallace  Somervllle  Paris  129 

haps,  what  gives  many  observers  (on  the  other 
side  of  the  water!)  an  idea  that  China  is  on 
the  eve  of  a  bloody  revolution,  when  an  at- 
tempt will  be  made  to  drive  out  the  foreigner. 
In  five  days  I  start  on  my  initial  trip  to  Ihsien." 

This  same  year  the  new  station  was  oc- 
cupied. Mr.  Paris  wrote  the  first  report  in 
September. 

"  Prescott  tells  us,"  he  writes,  "  of  the  won- 
der and  amazement  of  Hernando  Cortez  as 
from  a  neighbouring  mountain-top  he  gazed  on 
the  City  of  Mexico  and  the  adjacent  country. 
The  beauty  of  the  scene  enthralled  him.  It 
was  as  though  a  bit  of  Switzerland  were  trans- 
planted in  America.  In  like  manner,  he  who 
surveys  the  city  of  Ihsien  from  the  top  of  the 
surrounding  mountain  heights  cannot  but  re- 
mark on  the  surpassing  beauty  of  the  situa- 
tion. Take  your  stand  on  the  neighbouring 
Coal  Mountain,  and  you  get  an  excellent 
bird's-eye  view  of  the  city.  As  it  lies  four- 
square in  a  setting  of  the  eternal  hills,  it  re- 
minds one  of  a  gem  of  more  than  ordinary 
brilliance.  Closer  inspection,  however,  some- 
what dispels  the  illusion.  Por  Ihsien  is 
nothing  more  nor  less  than  a  Chinese  city.  In 
it  there  are  some  good  brick'  business  houses; 
yet  the  majority  of  the  buildings  are  of  mud, 
each  with  its  roof  of  straw.  The  city  is  dis- 
tinguished by  an  unusually  large  number  of 
memorial  arches,  and  by  the  aloofness  of  many 
of  its  inhabitants.     For  the  most  part,  these 


130      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

people  would  be  happier  if  the  foreigner  re- 
mained away.  It  is  a  noteworthy  fact  that 
some  of  the  finest  buildings  of  the  Ihsien 
district  are  found  outside  the  city.  There  are 
a  number  of  rich  farmers  in  the  region,  and, 
as  a  rule,  they  occupy  strong,  castle-like  struc- 
tures. The  natural  beauty  of  the  country, 
with  mountain  and  valley  and  stream  in  pic- 
turesque confusion,  is  enhanced  by  these  build- 
ings. At  the  same  time,  their  fortress-like 
appearance  reminds  one  that  thieves  and  high- 
waymen abound,  and  that  the  rich  are  safest 
when  behind  strong  walls.  The  situation  of 
the  city  compares  very  favourably  with  that 
of  any  other  mission  station  in  the  province. 
The  line  of  the  hymn  comes  unbidden  to  one's 
thoughts,  '  Where  every  prospect  pleases.'  It 
is  not  long,  however,  before  the  realization 
comes  home  that  the  second  phrase  is  also  ap- 
plicable : '  and  only  man  is  vile.'  Opium-smok- 
ing and  attendant  evils  are  found  in  Ihsien. 
As  to  that,  indeed,  in  what  Chinese  city  is  such 
not  the  case?  " 

Mr.  Faris  was  not  to  live  to  share  in  the 
fuller  harvest.  In  the  winter  and  spring  of 
1906-07  a  great  famine  prevailed  in  the  region 
south  of  Ihsien,  and  Mr.  Faris  went  down  to 
help  in  the  distribution  of  famine  relief.  There 
the  pressure  of  work  was  so  great  that  he 
literally  took  no  time  so  much  as  to  eat.  After 
four  weeks  of  ceaseless  toil,  he  began  to  suffer 
from  severe  abdominal  pain,  and  rode  back 


Wallace  Somerville  Faris  131 

to  Ihsien  in  almost  unbearable  agony.  The 
doctors  did  all  they  could  do  for  him,  but  the 
intestinal  stricture  from  which  he  was  suffer- 
ing was  beyond  their  reach,  and  he  was  too 
weak  for  an  operation.  When  he  was  told 
that  the  end  was  near,  he  recited  the  Twenty- 
third  Psalm  with  his  wife,  and  quietly  added, 
''  I  would  like  to  repeat  other  Psalms,  but  the 
time  is  too  short."  Then  he  sent  his  mother  a 
message,  '^  and  tell  each  member  of  the  fam- 
ily that  though  I  had  not  time  to  send  an  in- 
dividual message  I  thought  of  each  one." 
Then  he  fell  asleep  and  passed  beyond  all  pain. 
**  It  was  the  most  triumphant  death  I  ever  wit- 
nessed," said  one  of  the  attending  physicians. 
''  He  seemed  to  think  no  more  of  the  change 
than  would  have  been  the  case  if  he  had  re- 
ceived a  transfer  to  another  station." 

The  Chinese  mourned  him  sincerely.  The 
head  of  the  Mohammedans  at  T'ai  Ehr 
Chwang,  a  place  twenty  miles  south  on  the 
Grand  Canal,  sent  word  that  he  would  like  to 
erect  the  tablet  at  the  grave,  or  he  would  erect 
one  just  north  of  T'ai  Ehr  Chwang.  The  Gov- 
ernor of  the  province  at  Tsinanfu  was  deeply 
impressed  by  the  fact  that  four  people  gave  up 
their  lives  in  the  relief  work  and  ordered  the 
Ihsien  magistrate  to  put  up  a  ''  per  "  or  memo- 
rial to  Mr.  Faris. 


132      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

But  his  memorial  was  already  set  up  in  the 
hearts  of  those  who  had  known  him,  and  who 
recall  still  the  qualities  of  his  service,  modest, 
humble-spirited,  painstaking,  and  unselfish 
spirit. 

*'  I  feel  like  mentioning  two  chief  charac- 
teristics," writes  Mr,  Chalfant,  "  his  conscien- 
tiousness and  his  earnestness.  If  he  thought 
that  he  ought  to  do  a  thing  he  straightway- 
proceeded  to  do  it  at  whatever  cost  to  himself. 
It  is  this  characteristic  that  enables  God  to 
repose  confidence  in  men.  They  stand, 
morally,  upon  their  own  bottom.  They  will 
not  betray  their  trust.  Mr.  Faris  would  take 
no  end  of  trouble  over  every  little  affair  that 
came  up  in  his  work,  so  much  so  that  I  con- 
fess that  I  used  to  advise  him  to  take  things 
just  a  little  bit  easier!  I  have  not  the  least 
doubt  that  this  characteristic  partly  accounts 
for  his  collapse  in  the  famine  work.  Closely 
allied  to  this  conscientiousness  was  his  earnest- 
ness. He  had  a  keen  sense  of  humour,  but  he 
took  a  very  serious  view  of  his  work.  He  was 
entirely  in  earnest  in  doing  it,  and  the  result 
was  seen  in  many  ways.  He  was  a  man  of 
deep  feeling,  and  I  have  often  seen  his  eyes  fill 
with  tears  as  he  told  of  the  efforts  to  keep 
erring  Christians  on  the  right  track  that  had 
proved  abortive.  He  was  exceedingly  humble 
withal.  He  often  said  that  he  felt  that  *  some 
one  else  might  have  done  it  better.'  He  had 
a  naturally  hot  temper,  and  one  of  the  pleas- 


Wallace  Somerville  Faris  133 

ing  things  about  him  was  the  way  in  which 
he  held  it  in  check." 

"  He  was  a  pure,  manly,  and  modest  Chris- 
tian," writes  the  Rev.  R.  M.  Mateer.  ''  He 
had  a  lofty,  fragrant,  and  ever-abiding  pur- 
pose to  glorify  his  Lord,  which  was  easily 
manifested  in  his  daily  life.  This  consecra- 
tion was  rooted  in  and  nourished  by  strong 
convictions  concerning  the  great  truths  of  the 
Bible  that  were  handed  down  from  a  godly  an- 
cestry. This  famine,  from  which  he  was 
taken,  was  simply  an  illustration  of  his  whole 
missionary  life,  which  merited  the  Master's  '  I 
was  hungry  and  ye  fed  Me.'  "  *'  I  have  never 
seen  one  look  or  word,"  says  the  Rev.  H.  W. 
Luce,  ''  which  seemed  to  indicate  that  he  was 
not  fitted  for  the  Kingdom  of  God,  not  only 
in  its  earthly  form,  but  in  its  purer  form 
above."  *'  All  the  experiences  of  missionary 
life  he  went  through  without  disturbing,  so  far 
as  we  could  see,"  writes  another,  "  the  native 
sweetness  of  his  disposition  or  leading  him  to 
forget  the  command  to  *  honour  all  men  and 
love  the  brethren.'  " 

"  No  one  ever  thought  of  asking,"  says  an- 
other friend,  "  how  Faris  stood  on  any  ques- 
tion of  honour,  purity,  love  for  Christ  and  His 
cause,  and  for  his  fellow-students,  and  for- 


134      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

bearance  and  charity  in  view  of  their  faults. 
So  stainless  was  his  character  that  it  might 
well  have  been  said  of  him,  *  Behold,  an  Is- 
raelite indeed,  in  whom  is  no  guile ! '  I  am 
sure  that  Jesus  might  have  said  that  of  Wal- 
lace as  truly  as  of  Nathanael.  Yet  withal  he 
was  humble,  and  never  dreamed  of  putting 
himself  on  a  pedestal  above  his  fellows.  He 
had  no  harsh  judgment  for  their  shortcomings. 
Although  these  were  often  glaring  enough,  I 
have  sometimes  wondered  whether  he  saw 
them.     Suspicion  was  foreign  to  his  nature." 

"  He  was  a  man  whom  I  very  much 
esteemed,"  says  Mr.  Fowler,  the  American 
Consul-General  at  Chefoo,  ''  and  I  was  proud 
of  his  friendship  for  me.  I  always  remem- 
bered his  kindly  manner,  his  intense  devotion 
to  his  calling,  and  the  many,  many  courtesies 
I  have  received  from  him." 

"  His  whole  life,"  wrote  the  pastor  of  the 
church  at  Anna,  Illinois,  where  he  spent  his 
boyhood,  ''  has  been  one  tremendous  witness 
for  Jesus,  and  I  have  heard  expressions  from 
men  to-day  showing  that  even  a  boy's  con- 
sistency impresses  itself  upon  older  people.  I 
do  not  say  it  because  he  has  gone  from  us,  but 
because  it  is  true, — he  is  the  only  man  I  have 
heard  talked  of  in  this  community  about  whom 
I  have  not  heard  a  single  word  of  criticism  or 
censure.  I  am  not  speaking  of  the  conversa- 
tions of  yesterday  and  to-day,  but  the  dozens 


Wallace  Somerville  Faris  135 

of  informal  chats  I  have  had  with  all  kinds 
of  people  in  the  past.  I  do  not  mean  to  say 
he  was  perfect,  but  I  really  think  he  was  as 
near  perfection  as  we  may  find  here  on  earth. 
He  has  left  a  great  heritage  to  this  community 
in  his  influence  for  righteousness." 

What  life  can  be  richer  or  more  joyful  than 
such  a  life?  The  struggle  was  there,  the  con- 
flict with  sin  and  the  effort  for  achievement. 
And  the  peace  was  there,  the  deep  peace  of 
selfless  love  of  God  and  men,  the  calm  peace 
of  the  lowly  and  ministering  heart.  What  is 
there  in  life  better  or  more  blessed  than  this 
struggle  and  this  peace? 


IX 

PETER  CARTER— ''  SON  OF 
CONSOLATION  " 

OUTSIDE  of  the  circle  of  his  own 
friends  and  acquaintances,  few  were 
aware  how  great  a  soul  had  passed 
in  the  death  of  Peter  Carter  at  Bloom- 
field,  New  Jersey,  on  Monday,  March  19,  1900. 
But  those  who  knew  him,  and  who  loved  the 
dear  old  man  with  his  radiant  face  and  his 
overflowing  heart,  were  sensible  of  a  great  loss, 
and  knew  that  his  home-coming  was  greeted 
with  joy  by  the  angels.  He  was  the  kind  of 
man  who  is  the  best  proof  of  the  truth  of 
Christianity  and  the  power  of  Christ.  No  one 
ever  saw  an  inconsistency  or  insincerity  or  mis- 
deed in  him,  and  he  could  not  be  with  any  one 
without  soon  bubbling  over  in  his  beaming  love 
of  Christ  and  his  unselfish  love  of  men. 

Seventy  years  ago  Peter  Carter  was  an  office 
boy  in  the  Presbyterian  Board  of  Foreign 
Missions,  when  its  offices  were  at  23  Centre 
Street,  New  York  City.  He  had  come  over  to 
the  United  States  from  Scotland  with  his  par- 
ents and  brothers  and  sisters  in  1832.     The 

136 


Peter  Carter — "  Son  of  Consolation  "  137 

family  settled  in  Saratoga  County,  New  York, 
and  Peter  soon  began  work  in  New  York  City, 
where  his  brother  Robert  was  already  in  the 
publishing  business.  In  Scotland  they  had  been 
weavers  in  Earlston,  their  cottage  having  six 
looms  worked  by  the  father,  his  two  eldest 
sons,  and  hired  helpers.  It  was  a  true  Chris- 
tian home  of  the  best  sort  found  in  Scot- 
land. "  The  minister  went  from  house  to 
house  duly  examining  the  children  in  their 
knowledge  of  the  Scriptures  and  the  Cate- 
chism, and  it  has  been  said  that  if,  at  nine 
o'clock  at  night,  one  had  gone  through  the 
village,  he  would  have  heard  the  sound  of 
psalm  singing,  and  prayer,  and  reading  of  the 
Word  of  God  in  every  house,  so  general  was 
the  custom  of  family  worship." 

Thomas  Carter,  the  father,  was  an  active 
Christian  man  in  his  new  home  in  America,  as 
he  had  been  in  his  old  in  Scotland,  and  was 
an  earnest  advocate  of  total  abstinence  and  a 
strong  anti-slavery  man.  In  the  days  of  the 
Fugitive  Slave  Law,  he  was  a  conductor  on 
the  Underground  Railroad.  He  had  eleven 
children,  and  over  fifty  grandchildren,  and  as 
many  great-grandchildren,  and  it  is  believed 
that  not  one  of  the  members  of  the  family 
ever  used  intoxicating  drink.  He  took  great 
interest  in  the  publications  of  his  sons. 


138      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

"  On  one  occasion/'  as  we  read  in  the  life 
of  Robert  Carter,  his  oldest  son,  which  all 
young  people,  and  old  people  too,  should  read, 
"  he  came  to  New  York  for  his  annual  visit 
just  after  his  son  had  published  '  Lights  and 
Shadows  of  Scottish  Life,'  by  Professor  John 
Wilson,  who  wrote  under  the  noui  de  plume 
of  Christopher  North.  The  old  gentleman 
said  to  his  son,  '  I  am  sorry  to  hear  you've 
been  publishing  a  novel,'  accenting,  in  his  Scot- 
tish dialect,  the  last  syllable.  Mr.  Carter  in 
vain  tried  to  defend  himself  by  speaking  of 
the  purity  and  elegant  style  of  what  was  in- 
deed a  classic  work,  but  his  father  would  not 
be  mollified,  insisting  that  novels  were  very 
dangerous  reading. 

''  That  night,  after  tea,  Mr.  Carter  took  a 
book,  saying,  ^  Father,  here  is  something  I  want 
to  read  to  you,'  and  read  aloud  the  story  of 
*  The  Elder's  Death-bed.'  The  old  man  lis- 
tened with  tears  rolling  down  his  cheeks. 

'' '  Eh,  Robert,  that's  a  graund  buik.  Where 
did  ye  get  it  ? ' 

''  Mr.  Carter  told  him  that  he  had  been 
reading  from  the  novel  that  had  been  so 
severely  denounced  in  the  morning. 

"  *  I  didna  ken  it  was  such  a  buik  as  yon. 
Ye  maun  gie  me  some  for  the  neebors  at 
hame.'  " 

In  due  time  Peter  and  his  brother  Walter 
were  taken  into  the  publishing  business  by 
Robert.  When  the  partnership  was  formed, 
the  brothers  signed  a  written  paper,  pledging 


Peter  Carter — "  Son  of  Consolation  "  139 

themselves  never  to  "  go  security."  Their 
father  had  done  this  once,  and  been  burdened 
greatly  by  the  obligation  it  entailed  until  Rob- 
ert paid  off  all  the  indebtedness  for  him.  It 
was  another  of  their  principles  never  to  en- 
gage in  a  lawsuit.  They  preferred  to  suffer 
wrong  rather  than  violate  their  principles  of 
peace. 

The  love  of  books  was  born  in  these  Scotch 
boys.  Peter  Carter  loved  to  tell  a  story  of 
Robert's  about  his  first  venture  in  book-buying. 

*'  When  I  was  about  seven  years  old,"  said 
Robert,  ''  there  was  an  auction  sale  of  old 
furniture,  which,  as  it  was  a  rare  occurrence 
in  the  village,  I  attended  with  great  interest. 
Towards  the  close  of  the  sale,  a  copy  of  Jo- 
sephus's  works  in  folio,  much  dilapidated,  and 
minus  one  of  the  boards  of  the  cover,  was 
held  up  by  the  auctioneer,  and,  as  no  one 
seemed  to  bid,  I  called  out,  *  Fourpence.'  *  It 
is  yours,'  cried  he,  *  my  little  fellow;  you're 
the  youngest  bidder  we've  had  to-day.'  This 
fourpence  had  been  collecting  for  some  time 
previously,  and  was  probably  the  largest  sum 
I  had  ever  possessed.  When  I  got  the  book 
in  my  arms,  it  w^as  with  no  small  difficulty  I 
carried  it  home.  With  an  apple  I  hired  a 
playmate  to  help  me,  and  we  carried  it  between 
us,  and  when  we  got  tired  we  laid  the  book 
down  on  the  roadside  and  rested,  each  sitting 
on  an  end.    But  oh,  what  a  treasure  it  proved 


140      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

while  I  eagerly  devoured  its  contents!  I  used 
to  lay  it  down  upon  the  cottage  floor,  and 
myself  beside  or  upon  it,  and  travel  slowly 
down  the  long  page  until  I  reached  the  bottom, 
and  then  tackle  the  next  page.  I  had  read 
the  Bible  through  twice  in  order,  and  I  was 
eager  to  get  all  the  additional  information  I 
could  about  the  Jews.  I  was  greatly  puzzled 
by  the  word  '  Greeting,'  which  occurred  so 
often  as  a  salutation  at  the  beginning  of  letters. 
That  was  our  Scottish  word  for  *  crying,'  and 
I  could  not  understand  its  relation  to  letters 
bearing  good  tidings.^' 

Peter  took  great  delight  in  his  business,  as 
he  did  in  all  that  was  true  and  good,  but  he 
took  most  delight  in  speaking  of  his  Saviour 
and  in  trying  to  show  people  by  his  loving 
kindness  and  gracious  speech  how  precious  the 
Saviour  is.  He  had  always  a  special  interest 
in  negroes.  He  told  me  once  how  frightened 
he  had  been  in  New  York  when  he  saw  a 
negro  for  the  first  time.  He  was  walking  on 
the  street  with  his  mother,  and  clung  to  her 
skirts  in  terror  at  the  sight  of  the  black  face. 
When  he  grew  up  and  was  working  in  New 
York,  he  had  a  mission  school  for  negro  chil- 
dren, away  down  town.  He  was  very  fond 
of  the  little  ones,  and  they  were  devoted  to  him. 
Once  a  visitor  was  examining  the  children,  and 
asked  them,  "  Children,  do  you  know  who  the 


Peter  Carter — "  Son  of  Consolation  "  141 

Good  Shepherd  is?"  "Oh,  yes!"  they  re- 
pHed.  *'  Mr.  Peter  Carter."  And  he  was  to 
them  truly  the  representative  of  that  Good 
Shepherd  who  took  the  Httle  lambs  up  into 
His  bosom. 

And  indeed  how  can  those  who  do  not  know 
Christ  and  our  Father's  home  in  heaven  form 
any  idea  of  them  save  from  what  they  see 
in  us  and  our  homes?  That  is  the  way  the 
heathen  learn  of  Christ  and  heaven.  In 
Hangchow,  China,  Mrs.  Mattox  has  been  ac- 
customed to  invite  the  little  children  to  her 
home  and  make  them  happy  there.  Once  .a 
Chinese  teacher  was  talking  to  some  of  them, 
and  asked,  "  Where  do  you  want  to  go  when 
you  die — to  heaven?  "  "  No,"  they  answered. 
"  To  hell?  "  "  No."  "  Where,  then,  do  you 
want  to  go?"  "To  Mrs.  Mattox's  house," 
they  replied.  They  could  not  imagine  any- 
thing more  heavenly  than  that. 

In  these  children  of  the  other  side  of  the 
world  Mr.  Carter  was  always  intensely  in- 
terested. One  of  his  daughters  is  a  mission- 
ary in  Turkey,  and  two  grand-nephews  in 
China,  and  he  always  read  about  missions, 
talked  about  missions,  and  prayed  about 
missions.  On  his  death-bed,  when  he  was  not 
conscious  of  those  who  were  about  him,  they 
heard  him  praying  for  China.     It  had  become 


142      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

a  part  of  his  real  nature  to  pray  for  the  heathen 
world  and  the  work  of  Christ  there,  and,  when 
the  conscious  control  of  the  life  was  released, 
it  naturally  glided  off  into  loving  prayer  for 
the  needy. 

Mr.  Carter  was  one  of  the  most  sympathetic, 
appreciative  men  I  ever  met.  He  would  laugh 
at  humorous  and  pleasant  stories  until  the  tears 
ran  down  his  cheeks,  and  the  tears  were  as 
ready  to  flow  with  sympathy  for  sorrow  or 
suffering.  His  face  was  always  lighted  up 
from  within  by  the  light  of  Christ.  The  last 
Sunday  evening  on  which  he  was  able  to  at- 
tend church,  he  went  up^  at  the  close  of  the 
meeting,  to  his  new  pastor,  with  his  eyes  ablaze 
with  joy  at  the  satisfaction  he  felt  in  his  ser- 
mon and  in  him,  to  welcome  him  with  all  the 
enthusiasm  of  his  boyish  heart.  He  always 
saw  and  exulted  in  the  good  in  men,  and  had 
no  eye  toward  the  evil.  His  judgments  were 
sure  to  be  always  sweet,  kindly  judgments. 

And  he  never  lost  his  simplicity  and  glad- 
ness. He  was  the  jolliest  playmate  his  grand- 
children had,  and  they  could  not  think  of  him 
as  gone  not  to  return.  ''  Mother,"  said  one 
of  them,  after  his  death,  ''  I  know  grandfather 
has  gone  to  heaven  to  get  a  new  body,  but 
will  he  not  come  back  on  the  next  train?  "  I 
used  to   meet   him   constantly   on  the    ferry- 


Peter  Carter — "  Son  of  Consolation  "  143 

boats  and  street-cars,  and  he  was  the  merriest 
companion  in  the  world.  All  the  people  about 
visibly  brightened  up  with  the  contagious  good 
humour  and  sweetness  of  the  old  man.  And 
he  was  not  at  all  conscious  of  himself.  In 
the  street-car  he  would  talk  of  Jesus  just  as 
naturally  as  in  his  own  home,  and  with  no 
attempt  to  conceal  the  subject  nor  any  half- 
apologetic  glance  around  to  see  if  any  one  was 
listening. 

I  think  I  have  scarcely  known  any  man  who 
better  represented  the  Holy  Spirit,  the  Com- 
forter, or  more  deser\^ed  the  name  "  The  Son 
of  Consolation."  His  very  presence  was  com- 
fort, and  all  cares  and  mean  things  sank  away 
before  the  visible  composure  and  peace  of  his 
life.  He  had  those  qualities  of  honest  com- 
passion and  natural  unselfishness,  and  tender, 
mature  experience  of  God,  which  fitted  him 
to  comfort  those  that  mourn.  And  he  was  so 
perfectly  true  and  transparent  that  he  was  at 
home  anywhere.  He  was  a  gentleman  by  right 
of  divine  descent  and  heavenly  breeding,  for 
he  was  a  true  son  of  God. 

And  he  had  the  priceless  discipline  of  his 
own  sorrow.  Some  years  ago  his  wife  went 
on  before  him,  and  he  was  but  waiting  the 
call  to  come  home  to  her.  When  he  first  be- 
came ill,  he  told  his  daughter  that  he  felt  so 


144      ^^^  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

different  from  other  times.  When  she  sug- 
gested that  this  might  mean  that  he  would 
never  be  ill  again,  but  would  soon  be  going 
home,  "  Oh,  that  would  be  delightful ! ''  he 
replied,  and  he  hailed  the  prospect  of  meeting 
her  and  the  Saviour  he  loved  with  exceeding 
joy.  During  his  last  days  he  was  often  heard 
murmuring,  "  My  dear  Lord  Jesus,  my  dear 
Lord  Jesus.''  And  we  may  be  sure  they  were 
very  dear  each  to  the  other. 

Of  money  I  suppose  he  had  little  when  he 
died,  but  there  was  no  richer  man  in  New 
York  in  all  the  best  wealth  of  life, — a  char- 
acter less  blemished  than  the  sun,  a  heart  of 
solid  gold,  the  perfect  love  and  trust  of  friends, 
the  absolute  devotion  of  little  children,  and 
the  image  in  his  face  and  his  life  of  the 
blessed  Saviour  whom  he  adored.  If  all  the 
reasoned  arguments  in  support  of  Christianity 
were  destroyed,  Peter  Carter  and  the  two  or 
three  men  like  him  whom  I  have  known  would 
remain  for  me  as  its  impregnable  basis  and 
defence. 


X 

ARTHUR  TAPPAN  PIERSON 

4  RTHUR  TAPPAN  PIERSON  was  one 
r\  of  the  great  seers  of  the  world  vision. 
Early  in  his  ministry  he  lifted  up  his 
eyes  and  looked  upon  the  field,  and  as  he 
looked  he  saw  that  it  extended  far  beyond 
his  successive  parishes  in  Binghamton,  Water- 
ford,  Detroit,  Indianapolis,  Philadelphia,  Lon- 
don— that  it  embraced  the  whole  world. 
There  are  many  still  who  do  not  see  this 
or  who,  thinking  they  see  it,  are  neverthe- 
less dominated  by  preferences  which  split  up 
the  world  and  postpone  the  claims  of  parts 
of  it  until  other  parts  have  been  first  supplied, 
or  condition  the  offer  of  the  gospel  to  some 
for  whom  Christ  died  upon  its  prior  accept- 
ance by  others  for  whom  He  died  no  more. 
But  Dr.  Pierson  saw  the  world  whole,  and 
thenceforward  he  lived  and  wTought  for  the 
evangelization  of  it  all,  America  and  England, 
France  and  Russia  equally  with  China,  India, 
and  Africa,  and  these  equally  with  those.  This 
world  view  profoundly  affected  his  conception 

145 


146      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

of  the  gospel  and  of  Christ.  It  gave  him  a 
gospel  as  great  as  all  humanity  and  a  Christ 
greater  than  humanity.  The  view  which  men 
take  of  Christ  is  determined  largely  by  the 
work  they  expect  of  Him.  If  all  that  is  ex- 
pected is  an  ethical  example,  the  person  of 
Christ  contracts  to  that  expectation.  When 
men  have  had  a  deep  sense  of  sin  and  realized 
that  the  work  which  must  be  done  for  them 
is  a  work  which  only  the  Eternal  in  the 
flesh  could  do,  then  the  person  of  Christ  has 
expanded  and  men  have  seen  in  Him  their 
glorious  God.  Dr.  Pierson  had  the  great  view 
of  Christ  which  a  profound  sense  of  sin  and 
of  sin's  awfulness  and  of  the  wonder  of  sin's 
forgiveness  and  defeat  gives  to  a  man.  But 
he  had  an  even  greater  view  of  Christ,  for  to 
the  immensity  of  the  work  which  he  saw  Christ 
doing  in  a  single  soul  in  dealing  with  sin,  was 
added  the  immensity  of  the  work  which  he 
saw  Christ  was  to  do  for  the  world  in  de- 
stroying its  sin,  and  by  His  own  promises  and 
in  His  own  time,  bringing  in  His  world  King- 
dom. 

These  views  of  the  world  as  the  object  of 
Christ's  love  and  redeeming  grace,  and  as  the 
field  of  the  Church's  mission,  gave  him  a 
gospel  adequate  to  the  needs  of  each  human 
soul  and  of  our  home  lands.  He  early  per- 


Arthur  Tappan  Pierson  147 

ceived  that  an  English  gospel  cannot  save 
England  or  a  single  Englishman,  that  the  only 
gospel  which  is  adequate  to  any  local  need 
is  the  universal  gospel,  and  that  the  sooner 
and  the  more  fully  we  offer  it  to  every  crea- 
ture, the  richer  and  more  massive  will  be  its 
appeal  and  its  ministry  to  each  creature.  A 
gospel  which  is  as  busy  saving  China  as  it  is 
in  saving  Scotland  will  the  sooner  and  more 
effectively  save  both.  He  saw  this,  and  his 
evangelistic  message,  which  was  ever  fresh  and 
effective,  was  indissolubly  bound  to  his  mis- 
sionary message.  And  conversely,  he  realized 
that  the  gospel  which  is  to  be  able  to  cross 
wide  seas  and  make  an  impact  on  heathen 
lands  must  have  an  enormous  momentum, 
which  can  only  be  given  to  it  at  home,  and 
which  must  be  given  to  it  here,  if  it  is  not 
to  arrive  with  spent  vitality. 

In  the  second  place.  Dr.  Pierson  was  one 
of  the  first  to  bring  back  into  the  missionary 
idea  the  conception  of  immediacy.  The  early 
Church  felt  the  pressure  of  this  conception  in 
full  power.  It  was  looking  and  hoping  for 
the  second  coming  of  Christ,  and  that  great 
expectation  filled  it  with  the  earnestness  and 
eagerness  and  intensity  which  came  from  its 
conviction  that  its  enterprise  was  practicable 
and  that  it  might  and  must  make  ready  for 


148      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

the  coming  of  the  Son  of  Man.  Dr.  Pierson 
held  in  this  regard  the  Apostolic  expectation. 
He  did  not  fix  the  time  of  our  Lord's  return, 
just  as  the  New  Testament  writers  did  not, 
but  he  knew  that  the  Christian's  proper  atti- 
tude, if  he  is  to  be  faithful  to  his  Lord,  is 
the  attitude  of  vigilant  preparedness.  ^'  Watch, 
therefore,  for  at  such  an  hour  as  ye  think 
not,  the  Son  of  Man  cometh."  But  it  was 
not  from  the  Apostolic  hope  alone  that  he 
drew  this  spirit,  although  the  connection  be- 
tween Christ's  second  coming  and  world  evan- 
gelization, was  to  him,  as  it  is  to  many,  a 
Scriptural  principle;  it  was  also  from  his  study 
of  the  world's  need  of  the  gospel,  from  the 
New  Testament  representation  of  the  salvation 
of  Christ  as  the  only  salvation,  from  the  rapid 
movements  of  the  world's  life,  from  the  open- 
ing of  all  doors,  from  the  challenging  successes 
of  mission  work,  from  the  peril  of  spiritual 
declension  and  poverty  at  home,  if  the  pri- 
mary duty  of  the  Church  was  neglected.  All 
these  and  other  considerations  combined  to 
fill  him  with  an  eager  energy  for  immediate 
efforts  to  carry  the  gospel  to  the  whole  world. 
The  founders  of  the  modern  missionary  en- 
terprise struck  this  same  note  of  immediacy. 
The  evangelization  of  the  world  in  their  gen- 
eration was  the  noble  dream  of  the  early  mis- 


Arthur  Tappan  Pierson  149 

sionaries  to  the  Sandwich  Islands.  But  for  a 
generation  or  more  the  note  of  urgency  had 
died  low.  Now  it  has  sounded  forth  again  loud 
and  clear.  It  was  the  dominant  note  at  the 
Edinburgh  Missionary  Conference,  and  to 
many  that  rich  and  almost  ecumenical  reasser- 
tion  of  the  immediacy  of  our  missionary  duty 
was  but  the  full  and  rounded  utterance  of  the 
message  of  which  Dr.  Pierson  and  a  few  others 
were  the  lonely  voices  in  the  wilderness,  a 
quarter  of  a  century  ago. 

*'  The  Crisis  of  Missions  "  was  the  book  in 
which  Dr.  Pierson  put  his  appeal — crisp, 
sharp,  arousing.  Hundreds  of  present-day  ad- 
vocates of  missions  got  their  first  inspiration 
from  that  book.  Some  mission  boards  dis- 
tributed it  gratuitously  to  all  ministers  of  their 
denomination  who  would  promise  to  preach 
sermons  on  it.  There  are  many  situations 
which  are  called  "  crises  "  which  turn  out  very 
ordinary,  and  there  are  situations  carelessly 
passed  over  by  the  Church  which  are  real 
crises,  but  the  world  conditions  which  were 
beginning  when  Dr.  Pierson  wrote  this  little 
book,  and  the  new  missionary  call  which  was 
presented  to  the  Church,  did  truly  constitute  a 
crisis,  and  this  trumpet  blast  helped  as  much 
as  any  single  influence  to  awaken  the  Church 
to  realize  the  significance  of  the  new  day. 


150      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

A  third  great  missionary  service  rendered 
by  Dr.  Pierson  was  his  part  in  the  creation 
of  a  new  type  of  missionary  apologetic.  He 
was  one  of  a  Httle  group,  of  which  no  one 
accomphshed  more  than  he,  which  produced 
a  new  sort  of  missionary  Hterature.  This  new 
type  laid  as  much  emphasis  as  the  old  upon 
Scripture  principles  and  the  general  grounds 
of  appeal,  but  it  was  marked  by  a  tingle,  a 
warmth,  a  penetration,  an  imagination  which 
were  new,  and  it  was  filled  with  incident  and 
anecdote  and  fact.  It  ranged  the  whole  world 
of  life  and  all  literature  for  its  material,  and 
it  fused  all  the  material  into  a  red  and  con- 
tagious glow.  There  was  always  the  peril  in 
such  an  apologetic  of  overstrain,  of  seeing 
things  in  disproportion,  of  startling  the  reader 
by  taking  hidden  aspects  and  setting  them  in 
too  brilliant  a  light,  but  these  are  the  perils 
of  all  propagandas,  and  if  there  was  room  for 
differences  of  spiritual  interpretation,  never- 
theless, the  effort  was  always  made  to  present 
facts  and  to  be  sure  that  they  were  facts. 
In  public  speech  no  men  excelled  Dr.  Pier- 
son,  Dr.  A.  J.  Gordon,  and  Dr.  F.  F.  Ellin- 
wood  in  presenting  the  new  apologetic  for 
missions,  and  in  work  with  his  pen  Dr.  Pier- 
son  probably  did  more  than  any  other  one 
person  to  popularize  missionary  information 


Arthur  Tappan  Pierson  151 

and  appeal.     His  books  on  ''  The  Miracles  of 
Missions,"  his  ''  New  Acts  of  the  Apostles," 
his  missionary  biographies  such  as  of  Muller 
and  Johnson,  and  his  articles  in  the  Missionary 
Review  were  read  by  multitudes  who  began  to 
see  that  missions  was  one  of  the  most  interest- 
ing and   fascinating  of  themes.     The  "  New 
Acts  of  the  Apostles  "   constituted   the   Duff 
Missionary  Lectures,  delivered  in  Scotland  in 
1893.     He  and  Dr.  Gordon  had  gone  through 
Scotland  together  after  the  World  Missionary 
Conference    in    London    in    1888,    and    had 
kindled   missionary   fires   wherever   they   had 
gone.     In  consequence.  Dr.  Pierson  was  called 
back  in  1893  for  the  Duff  Lectures,  of  which 
Dr.  Andrew  Thomson,  one  of  the  older  mis- 
sionary authorities,  wrote: 

"The  fourth  and  most  recent  Duff  Lec- 
turer was  the  Rev.  Arthur  T.  Pierson,  D.D., 
of  Philadelphia,  U.  S.  A.,  whose  name  is 
pleasantly  familiar  to  the  Churches  of  Christ 
on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic.  The  title  of 
his  lectures,  which  form  the  contents  of  the 
present  volume,  is  '  The  New  Acts  of  the 
Apostles;  or,  The  Marvels  of  Modern  Mis- 
sions,' and  their  design  was  to  compare  the 
Christian  Church  in  the  nineteenth  century 
with  the  Church  in  the  first  century,  especially 
in  their  missionary  aspects,  and  to  bring  out 
the  features  of  resemblance  and  of  contrast 


152      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

between  them.  They  were  addressed  in  the 
early  months  of  1893,  to  crowded  audiences, 
not  only  in  Edinburgh  and  Glasgow,  but  in 
Aberdeen,  Dundee,  and  St.  Andrew's,  and 
some  individual  lectures  were  also  delivered 
in  other  places,  as  in  Arbroath.  They  were 
as  new  and  fragrant  as  the  flowers  of  spring. 
His  vigour  and  originality  of  thought,  his 
extraordinary  knowledge  of  all  subjects  con- 
nected with  Christian  missions,  his  ingenuity 
and  skill  in  the  exposition  of  Scripture,  and 
in  extracting  from  familiar  texts  new  and 
unexpected  stores  of  instruction,  his  inex- 
haustible command  of  anecdotes  which  helped 
to  enrich  and  enliven  his  addresses,  his  power 
of  making  external  nature  pay  tribute  to 
spiritual  instruction,  as  well  as  the  flowing 
fervour  of  his  appeals — made  multitudes  lis- 
ten unwearied  for  hours  in  silence." 

Dr.  Pierson  early  learned  to  view  the  mis- 
sionary task  as  the  task  of  the  whole  Church. 
Much  was  said  in  the  Edinburgh  Missionary 
Conference  and  in  the  preparation  for  the 
Conference  there  of  the  opportunity  which 
the  Conference  was  to  present  for  the  first 
time  to  the  Church  of  viewing  her  under- 
taking as  a  whole — the  whole  Church  facing 
her  whole  task  in  the  whole  world.  This 
conception,  though  it  was  only  limitedly 
possible  at  Edinburgh,  gave  its  greatness  to 
that  memorable  conference.    But  for  a  genera- 


Arthur  Tappan  Picrson  153 

tion  Dr.  Pierson  had  been  preaching  this  idea. 
At  Northfield,  I  think,  in  1887,  he  set  forth 
a  plan  of  world  missionary  activity  which  in- 
volved the  united  effort  of  the  Church  to 
compass  her  whole  task,  and  such  a  plan,  I 
believe,  was  printed  as  a  supplement  in  some 
editions  of  ''  The  Crisis  of  Missions."  To  be 
sure,  this  was  not  a  new  idea  with  him.  Al- 
exander Duff  had  cherished  it,  and  no  later 
missionary  leader  was  more  zealous  than  Carey 
in  planning  for  the  occupation  of  the  whole 
earth,  but  it  was  deemed  novel  enough  to  be 
scouted  by  many  when  Dr.  Pierson  renewed 
the  proposal  of  an  organized,  co-operative 
effort  to  occupy  and  evangelize  the  whole 
world. 

In  his  eagerness  to  make  missions  popular 
and  to  win  for  them  the  interest  and  support 
of  the  Church,  he  did  not  make  the  mistake 
of  secularizing  the  missionary  presentation,  of 
lowering  the  spiritual  quality  of  the  missionary 
motive,  of  withdrawing  the  Cross.  He  put 
the  missionary  appeal  upon  the  highest  spirit- 
ual plane,  and  no  one  ever  heard  him  present 
the  cause  without  being  made  aware  of  the 
sacrificial  shadow  that  lay  upon  it.  It  is  in- 
teresting to  note  how  free  the  foreign  mission- 
ary appeal  still  is  from  secondary  and  inferior 
elements.     They  do  creep  in,  and  they  have 


154      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

their  legitimate  place,  but  while  some  other 
causes  have  become  practically  dominated  by 
these  considerations,  foreign  missions  remain 
a  spiritual  enterprise,  resting  upon  spiritual 
arguments  and  cleaving  close  still  to  the  person 
and  Cross  of  Christ.  It  was  no  small  achieve- 
ment of  the  Spirit  of  Christ  to  save  so  ardent 
an  advocate  as  Dr.  Pierson  from  the  perils 
of  overpopularizing  his  cause,  and  of  resting 
it  upon  motives  which  have  in  them  the  ele- 
ments, at  least,  of  self-interest,  of  a  racial 
or  national  glory.  His  cause  was  Christ's 
alone,  and  Christ's  name  and  Christ's  Cross 
and  Christ's  glory  were  the  only  things  to 
be  thought  about  or  spoken  of  in  its  advo- 
cacy. 

Lastly,  we  may  mention  the  tirelessness  of 
his  toil  for  missions  and  the  intensity  of  his 
appeal.  To  him  it  was  a  great  cause,  and  as 
the  preservation  of  the  Union,  the  abolition  of 
slavery,  the  maintenance  of  States'  rights  or 
political  loyalty  had  set  men  ablaze  and  kept 
the  fires  glowing  during  the  Civil  War,  so  the 
great  campaign  of  a  world's  evangelization  in- 
fluenced him  and  made  him  restive  and  eager. 
It  is  hard  to  keep  up  such  intensity  in  an  age- 
long campaign,  but  he  held  that  the  age  need 
not  be  as  long  as  lethargy  and  disobedience 
may  make  it,  and  that  now  is  the  appointed 


Arthur  Tappan  Pierson  155 

time,  and  not  to-morrow.  Therefore  he  re- 
membered his  Lord's  words :  "  We  must  work 
the  works  of  Him  that  sent  us  while  it  is 
day,  before  the  night  cometh,  when  no  man 
can  work."    May  we  also  remember  them! 


XI 

HENRY  CLAY  TRUMBULL 

HENRY  CLAY  TRUMBULL,  who 
died  in  Philadelphia  in  December, 
1903,  was  one  of  the  great  chaplains 
of  the  Civil  War.  After  the  war  he  was  one 
of  the  foremost  leaders  in  the  Sunday-school 
work  of  North  America  and  one  of  the  most 
original,  fertile,  and  influential  religious  edi- 
tors in  our  country.  He  was  also  a  genius  in 
Bible  study  and  Bible  teaching,  an  Oriental 
scholar  and  discoverer,  the  writer  of  a  score 
of  notable  books,  and  a  Christian  who  pre- 
sented in  his  own  life  the  immovable  evidence 
of  the  literal  truth  of  the  New  Testament  rep- 
resentation of  the  gospel  of  the  Son  of  God. 
His  life  story  is  told  in  the  admirable  biography 
by  his  son-in-law,  Mr.  Philip  E.  Howard. //As 
one  who  knew  him  as  a  son  and  who  was  also 
grateful  to  be  his  friend,  I  wish  to  speak  here 
of  his  influence  and  character,  in  behalf  of  the 
multitudes  of  young  men  who  knew  his  voice, 
and  who  trace  gratefully  to  him  to-day  the  un- 
sealing and  illumination  of  their  lives. 

156 


Henry  Clay  Trumbull  157 

He  taught  us  three  great  lessons,  the  great- 
est lessons  that  man  can  teach  to  men.  He 
showed  us  the  supremacy  of  truth.  Where 
everything  he  wrote  and  said  was  so  evidently 
only  the  unveiling  of  himself,  a  sort  of  fra- 
grant moral  exhalation,  it  would  not  be  true 
to  single  out  any  one  of  his  books  and  say, 
"  This  was  the  distinctive  expression  of  his 
teaching  and  of  himself,"  yet  I  think  that  one 
of  the  three  or  four  of  which  this  might  most 
truthfully  be  said  is  his  little  book  in  defence 
of  the  absolute  inviolability  of  truth.  With 
truth  compromised  he  felt  the  foundations 
were  gone.  Life  might  be  sacrificed.  He 
had  risked  his  in  battle  without  fear,  and  he 
has  written  with  noble  love  of  his  dearest 
friend,  who,  choosing  the  post  of  danger,  died 
in  battle  a  hero's  death.  Christ  Himself  had 
said,  "  No  man  taketh  my  life  from  me.  I 
lay  it  down  of  myself.  I  have  the  right  to 
lay  it  down."  And  God,  he  held,  was  taking 
life  daily,  even  as  His  Son  had  laid  down  His 
own.  What  God  could  do  he  could  authorize 
man  to  do,  but  God  could  not  lie,  and  what 
was  impossible  to  the  nature  of  God  was  in- 
tolerable in  the  character  and  ways  of  men. 
The  truth  was  to  him  a  holy  thing,  and  he 
abhorred  with  all  his  stern  soldier  soul  all 
falsehood  and  every  lie.    We  learned  this  from 


158      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

him.  May  God  grant  that  we  shall  not 
forget ! 

He  taught  us  the  glory  of  love.  He  thought 
himself,  when  he  had  finished  it,  that  "  Friend- 
ship the  Master  Passion,"  as  he  called  it,  was 
his  great  book,  and  he  believed  that  he  had 
demonstrated  that  there  is  no  power  in  the 
world  like  unselfish  love.  He  told  me  once 
that  when  he  had  finished  his  book  and  given 
it  to  his  friend,  Charles  Dudley  Warner,  Mr. 
Warner  said  to  him,  referring  to  the  theme  of 
the  book :  ''  Trumbull,  you  can't  prove  that 
proposition."  But  when  he  had  read  it  through 
he  said :  ''  Well,  Trumbull,  you  have  made 
your  case."  It  was  he  who  taught  us  what 
friendship  is, — a  love  that  asks  for  nothing 
again,  that  many  waters  cannot  quench,  serene, 
eternal.  No  teacher  of  our  generation  saw  as 
he  saw  the  nature  of  that  love  which  St.  John 
tells  us  is  God.  Beside  his  conception  all  other 
ideals  and  all  books  on  friendship  seem  tawdry 
and  of  a  lower  world.  We  who  were  in  his 
school  know  how  to  love.  He  taught  us,  and 
we  see  now  that,  next  to  truth,  the  most  won- 
drous thing  in  life  is  love,  unselfish,  unchange- 
able. 

He  taught  us  what  life  is.  This  was  what 
he  was  dealing  with  in  his  covenant  books,  on 
the  covenants  of  blood,  of  the  threshold,  and 


Henry  Clay  Trumbull  159 

of  salt.  Institutions,  he  held,  were  the  sym- 
bols of  life.  The  covenant  of  blood,  the  atone- 
ment, was  an  atonement  of  life.  He  taught 
the  reality  of  such  a  mingling.  The  mysticism 
of  the  Gospel  lay  like  the  veil  and  the  unveil- 
ing of  immortality  across  our  mortal  life.  He 
made  real  and  clear  to  us,  he  set  forth  in  the 
language  of  our  own  day,  the  living  truth  of 
the  Saviour's  words,  "  Except  ye  eat  the  flesh 
of  the  Son  of  man  and  drink  His  blood  ye 
have  not  life  in  yourselves.  He  that  eateth 
my  flesh  and  drinketh  my  blood  hath  eternal 
life."  He  held  to  the  truth  of  a  divine  inter- 
course. This  was  what  life  was  to  be,  a  fel-  | 
lowship  with  the  divine  life,  a  union  of  our 
souls  with  the  great  life  of  our  Father,  who 
is  God. 

And  what  he  taught  he  was.  No  discord 
severed  the  message  from  the  man.  What 
we  heard  from  his  lips  we  saw  in  his  life. 
We  came  near  to  him,  and  we  knew  him,  and 
we  knew  him  to  embody  in  himself  the  doc- 
trine which  he  taught  to  the  world.  He  loved 
the  truth.  No  shadow  of  insincerity  tinged 
him.  The  light  of  a  great  honour  was  in  him, 
and  the  air  where  he  was  was  pure,  and  it 
purified.  He  was  one  of  the  men  of  whom 
the  Psalmist  says :  "  They  looked  unto  Him, 
and  were  radiant."    He  exemplified  in  himself 


i6o      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

his  ideals  of  friendship.  He  would  go  any- 
where for  his  friends,  and  no  service  could 
be  a  sacrifice  for  one  he  loved.  I  have  known 
him  to  make  long  journeys  simply  to  make 
some  truth  which  he  thought  it  was  important 
for  a  friend  to  have  clear  to  that  friend's 
mind.  He  stopped  the  press  on  his  paper,  and 
held  up  an  entire  issue  to  cut  out  of  a  review 
of  a  friend's  book  a  single  phrase,  which  he 
had  just  discovered,  which  might  be  misun- 
derstood and  grieve  his  friend.  We  may  have 
many  more  friends,  we  shall  have,  for 
to-day  all  of  us  who  were  friends  of  his  are 
become  friends  also  of  one  another;  but  we 
shall  never  have  a  greater  friend  than  he  was, 
and  is,  and  all  our  friendships  have  now,  and 
will  have  forever,  a  divine  glory,  an  infinite 
security,  since  he  taught  us  by  his  words  and 
by  his  life  how  to  love  with  a  friendship  love. 
We  love  others  more,  and  more  truly,  because 
he  loved  us.  And  how  athrill  with  life  he 
was!  No  one  could  come  near  him  and  not 
feel  the  tingle  and  deliverance  of  it.  Stagna- 
tion fell  off  the  soul  at  the  touch  of  the  ex- 
hilaration of  life  in  him.  The  lines  about  his 
eyes  spoke  with  an  irresistible  eloquence  of 
delight.  The  nervous,  alert  form  trembled  in 
response  to  the  quick  movings  of  the  mind  and 
heart.     He  was  all  alive  in  his  body.     And 


Henry  Clay  Trumbull  l6i 

the  mind  was  even  more  quick  and  vital.  It 
shrank  from  anything  commonplace  and  medi- 
ocre. It  leaped  at  the  living  aspects  of  truth. 
It  sprang  past  the  inadequacy  of  systems  to 
the  infinite  life  that  cannot  be  codified.  And 
the  spirit  that  was  back  of  all,  that  came  from 
God  and  has  now  returned  whence  it  came, — 
oh,  friends !  shall  we  feel  upon  our  lives  an- 
other spirit  like  it  on  the  earth  again?  The 
life  of  God  was  in  it.  It  lived  in  God.  This 
we  shall  see  often.  This  we  may  experience 
ourselves.  But  the  buoyancy,  the  intensity, 
the  unassailable  certainty  of  that  life  equally 
hid  and  exposed  with  Christ  in  God,  the  natu- 
ralness in  the  supernaturalness,  the  assurance, 
the  humility,  the  living,  eager  joy  of  it  all — 
what  irrefutable,  what  positively  convincing, 
what  tenderly  persuasive,  evidence  this  bore  to 
the  reality  of  his  doctrine, — that  it  was  all  so 
incarnate  in  his  own  dear  life. 

And  this  was  the  great  characteristic  of  it  all. 
It  was  so  generous.  It  gave  itself  out  without 
reserve  or  weariness.  There  are  in  the  world 
to-day  thousands  upon  thousands  upon  thou- 
sands— I  speak  with  soberness  and  care — upon 
whose  lives  is  the  impress  of  his.  For  nearly 
two  generations  he  has  been  addressing  multi- 
tudes on  the  platform  or  by  the  pen,  but  he 
counted  truly  that  all  the  immense  influence  ex- 


1 62      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

erted  in  this  way  was  less  than  what  God  had 
done  through  him  by  personal  contact  with  in- 
dividuals, men  and  women,  and  also,  I  thank 
\  God,  with  many  who  were  but  little  more  than 
I  boys  and  girls,  to  win  them  to  Christ,  to  truth, 
to  love,  to  life.  He  found  individuals  every- 
where. He  loved  the  possibilities  in  them,  and 
he  sought  with  a  tact  that  was  unfailing  and 
a  courage  that  always,  as  he  confessed,  was 
needed  before  he  could  conquer  the  instinct  of 
hesitation,  but  that  never  failed,  to  make  those 
possibilities  real,  and  to  recover  life  to  itself 
and  to  the  Saviour.  His  influence  upon  stu- 
dents and  upon  the  Christian  Church  in  awak- 
,  ening  and  stimulating  the  spirit  of  personal 
work  by  individuals  for  individuals  to  win  men 
to  Christ  has  been  greater  than  that  of  any 
Christian  worker  in  the  last  fifty  years,  per- 
haps not  even  excepting  Mr.  Moody,  between 
whom  and  himself,  diverse  types  as  they  were, 
there  existed  the  warmest  friendship — a 
friendship  full  of  mutual  admiration  and  love. 
"  When  he  had  by  himself  purged  our  sins," 
we  read  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews,  "  he 
sat  down  on  the  right  hand  of  God."  This  is 
the  law  of  all  highest  service.  It  was  even  so 
with  him  whom  we  loved,  and  love  and  honour 
here  to-day.  He  wrought  by  the  outgoing  of 
himself.     And  he  has  taught  multitudes   of 


Henry  Clay  Trumbull  163 

Christian  men  that  such  outgoing  of  their  lives 
into  other  lives  is  the  law  of  the  service  of 
Christ. 

But  we  are  seeking  not  so  much  to  analyze 
his  character  as  to  give  utterance  to  our  grat- 
itude for  what  in  the  goodness  of  God  he  was 
to  our  lives.  How  boundlessly  appreciative 
and  generous  he  was — seeing  good  v^here  there 
was  no  good  except  in  his  seeing.  He  loved 
his  own  ideals  which  he  dreamed  he  saw  in 
others,  and  then  by  his  sheer  love  he  began 
to  create  them  in  others.  He  had  the  divine 
blindness  of  love  which  saw  past  the  evil  that 
can  be  expelled  from  life.  He  had  the  divine 
vision  of  love  which  beheld  the  invisible 
capacities  for  good  and  beauty.  It  was  both 
our  humiliation  and  our  glory  that  he  was 
ever  finding  in  us  nobleness  which  we  did  not 
know  was  possible  for  us,  until  he  loved  it 
into  being  in  us.  He  was  ever  recognizing 
what  he  owed  to  others,  living  and  dead.  He 
traced  his  life  and  work  tO'  four  religious 
teachers,  two  of  them  almost  forgotten.  Bush- 
nell  he  exalted  with  a  unique  love.  For  many 
of  us  he  created  Bushnell  anew.  What  gen- 
erosity was  this?  Was  he  not  an  apostle? 
Had  he  not  see  Christ?  Paul  not  more.  Yet 
his  unselfish  heart  was  ever  tracing  to  others 
with  gratitude  what  he  felt  he  owed  to  them. 


164      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

what  we  felt  was  native  and  sovereign  in  his 
own  soul.  How  warm  and  tender  were  his 
affections  and  sympathies!  One  of  his  sweet- 
est essays  was  on  ''  Tenderness,"  and  he  quoted 
in  it  the  sonnet, 

**  We  long  for  tenderness,  like  that  which  hung 
About  us,  lying  on  our  mother's  breast." 

And  such  tenderness  he  lavished  on  those  he 
loved.     It  was  in  his  hand-clasp.     It  was  in 
his  voice.     There  are  many  hearts  to  which 
the  memory   of   it   comes   back   as   of   some 
mother's  song  long  years  ago.    His  loves  never 
grew  old  and  frail.     There  was  about  them  a 
perennial  childlikeness  of  joy  and  surprise  and 
fresh  delight.     And  his  sympathies  were  as 
broad  and  charitable  as  they  were  tender.    He 
has  told  me  with  satisfaction  of  the  meeting 
of  the  Oriental  Society  in  his  home  years  ago, 
and  the  pleasure  he  had  in  arranging  every- 
thing so  as  to  be  true  to  his  own  large  life, 
and   also   just  and   considerate   of   others   of 
other  faiths  who  were  present  as  his  guests. 
He  was  bound  to  find  good  in  men.     I  know 
of  one  man  of  rigid  and  unimaginative  mind, 
to  whom  faith  is  a  strait-jacket,  who  for  years 
embodied  to  him  ideals  of  intellectual  method 
and  theological  opinion  of  which  he  utterly 


Henry  Clay  Trumbull  165 

disapproved.  Once  he  and  this  man  met  at 
luncheon,  and  he  found  to  his  delight  a  better 
nature  than  he  had  believed  could  be  there,  and 
an  unsuspected  openness  of  spirit.  Instantly 
his  whole  attitude  changed.  He  often  spoke 
to  me  with  delight  of  this.  He  forgot  all  that 
was  repugnant  thereafter,  and  he  thought  and 
spoke  of  this  man  with  the  spirit  of  generous 
and  loving  sympathy  which  he  longed  to  feel 
toward  all  men,  and  which  nothing  but  opposi- 
tion to  the  truth  or  a  reluctance  to  follow  after 
it  fully  ever  availed  to  suppress  in  him  toward 
any  man.  But  if  the  truth  was  betrayed,  how 
quick  and  intense  was  the  surprise  of  the  deep 
character  in  him !  Let  a  man  do  service  for 
falsehood  or  lay  hands  on  the  ark  of  truth, 
and  the  anger  of  the  divine  priesthood  awoke 
in  him.  That  man  saw  the  flash  of  his  in- 
dignant lightning  and  heard  the  rolling  thun- 
der of  his  wrath.  It  was  this  that  led  him  to 
write  with  such  fearless  severity  in  his  paper, 
years  ago,  an  editorial  criticism  upon  a  book 
on  ethics,  in  which  he  utterly  and  unhesitat- 
ingly repudiated  as  untrustworthy  and  un- 
christian a  book  that  made  room  for  lies. 
But  this  was  only  the  divine  undertoning.  The 
Saviour  stood  once  with  blazing  eyes  and  a 
whip  of  cords  in  His  hands.  He  was  none 
the  less — nay,  He  was  all  the  more — the  Shep- 


1 66      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

herd  true,  lover  of  souls,  lamb  of  God,  meek 
and  lowly  in  heart.  This  was  his  over  har- 
mony. Intense  as  he  was  in  his  love  of  truth, 
fiery  in  his  abhorrence  of  falsehood  and  of 
wrong,  his  touch  had  yet  the  tenderness  of  a 
woman's  hand.  Toning  dow^n  the  Saviour's 
qualities  of  calm  and  comfort  to  the  level  of 
us  men,  was  not  to  make  Dr.  Trumbull  heavy 
and  tame.  He  was  all  a-tingle.  There  was 
in  his  personality  a  perpetual  charm  and 
piquancy  and  zest.  He  saw  everything  in  fresh 
forms.  He  loved  paradox  because  it  so  well 
balanced  the  polarity  of  truth.  His  humour 
was  sweet  and  irrepressible  to  the  last.  And 
with  such  a  soul  how  tenderly  he  loved  his 
dear  Saviour!  It  was  just  so  that  he  would 
speak  of  him :  "  The  dear  Saviour."  And  now 
he  is  wath  Him.  Our  master  has  been  taken 
from  our  head.  Yea,  we  know  it,  and  our 
hearts  have  cried  after  him  with  Elisha's  cry, 
"  My  father,  my  father,  the  chariots  of  Israel 
and  the  horsemen  thereof!  " 

He  showed  us  what  it  is  to  be  free.  This 
blessing  also  he  brought  to  us  all, — I  mean  to 
us  young  men  who  loved  him.  Often  we  went 
to  him  for  counsel.  "  What  shall  we  do  ?  " 
He  would  not  answer  that.  *'  Shall  I  go 
here,  or  there?"  He  would  not  say.  He 
would  show  us  the  principles  which  he  believed 


Henry  Clay  Trumbull  167 

to  be  involved,  and  then  he  would  say  no  more. 
"  You  must  decide  for  yourself,"  was  his  word. 
He  loved  to  tell  of  an  old  Connecticut  farmer 
whose  son  was  about  to  seek  his  fortune  in 
the  city.    The  evening  before  he  was  to  go,  the 
father  took  him  for  a  last  walk  and  talk  over 
the  place  where  the  boy  had  spent  his  life. 
They  went  over  the  familiar  paths  in  silence, 
all  the  memories  of  his  past  education  in  right- 
eousness and  purity  of  soul  sweeping  in  wave 
after  wave  over  the  boy  as  he  walked  beside 
his  father,  until  at  last  they  returned  to  the 
garden  gate  again.    Then  the  old  man  turned 
to  his  son,  laid  his  hand  on  his  shoulder,  and 
said :  ''  John,  I  have  only  one  thing  to  say  to 
you.     Always  do  as  you  have  a  mind  to.'* 
The  boy  needed  no  more.     His  only  peril  lay 
in  doing  as  others  had  a  mind  for  him.     H  | 
he  acted  according  to  the  integrity  and  honour 
of  his  own  mind,   schooled  under  the  godly 
manliness  of  that  old  father,  he  was  safe  and 
free.     It  was  so  that  he  dealt  with  us.     He 
strove  to  give  us  the  mind  of  Christ,  and  then 
he  bade  us  do  as  we  had  a  mind  to.     He  was 
free  in  Christ,  and  he  would  have  us   free. 
He  held  to  the  law,  to  be  sure,  but  he  saw 
even  in  the  Ten  Commandments  a  covenant 
of  love.     Love,  he  believed  with  the  Apostle, 
was  the  fulfilling  of  the  law,  and  that  he  was 


1 68      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

the  freeman  whom  love  and  truth  made  free 
in  Christ  to  render  a  full  and  joyous  obedience. 

He  was  full  of  large  expectations  of  good. 
His  faith  was  in  God,  and  therefore  his  heart 
was  stayed  in  hope.  He  was  impatient  with 
the  easy  talk  of  the  day  about  the  retrogression 
of  religion,  and  the  diminished  study  of  the 
Bible.  He  knew  that  there  was  no  peril  of 
any  retrogression  except  in  the  heart  of  the 
man  who  thinks  it  is  in  the  world  because  it 
is  within  himself.  And  he  was  sure,  and 
rightly  so,  that  there  never  has  been  as  much 
belief  in  the  Bible,  or  study  of  it,  or  love  for 
it,  as  at  this  day.  God  could  not  lose  him. 
How  could  He  lose  the  world?  The  faith  of 
the  Resurrection  past  and  the  hope  of  the  Ad- 
vent yet  to  come,  bound  for  him  the  horizon 
of  a  world  of  the  goodness  and  greatness  of 
God,  full  of  the  assurance  of  the  triumph  of 
the  Saviour. 

He  was  a  true  prophet  of  God  to  our  souls. 
He  spoke  forth  the  Infinite  in  the  terms  of  our 
world,  and  the  Eternal  in  the  forms  of  our 
human  life.  God  was  near  him,  almost  visi- 
ble. His  faith  in  prayer  was  one  noble  ex- 
pression of  his  realization  of  the  present  power 
of  his  Father.  I  met  a  gentleman  who  knew 
him  some  years  ago  on  a  ferry  boat,  and  I  told 
him  that  when  I  had  last  seen  Dr.  Trumbull,  a 


Henry  Clay  Trumbull  169 

fortnight  before,  he  had  spoken  of  him.  *'  Oh, 
yes  !  "  said  my  friend,  ''  he  was  a  great  Chris- 
tian, so  real,  so  intense.  He  was  at  my  home 
years  ago,  and  we  were  talking  about  prayer. 
'  Why,  Trumbull,'  I  said,  '  you  don't  mean  to 
say  that  if  you  lost  a  lead  pencil  you  would  pray 
about  it,  and  ask  God  to  help  you  find  it.'  '  Of 
course  I  would;  of  course  I  would!'  was  his 
instant  and  excited  reply."  How  easy  it  is  to 
reproduce  the  very  sound  of  the  voice,  to  see 
the  flash  of  the  eye  and  the  trembling  gesture 
of  the  hand.  Of  course  he  would.  Was  not 
his  faith  a  real  thing?  Like  the  Saviour  he 
put  his  doctrine  strongly  by  taking  an  extreme 
illustration  to  embody  his  principle,  but  the 
principle  was  fundamental.  He  would  trust 
God  in  everything.  He  did  trust  Him.  And 
the  Father  honoured  the  trust  of  His  child. 
And  he  always  walked  with  God  in  Christ. 
Very  near,  very  real,  very  precious,  was  the 
Lord  Jesus  to  him,  and  into  that  loving  inti- 
macy he  bore,  faithful  friend  that  he  was,  all 
the  needs  and  names  of  his  dear  ones,  speak- 
ing of  us  and  of  our  children  to  his  Father 
and  our  Father,  his  God  and  our  God. 

One  of  his  favourite  thoughts  embodied  long 
years  ago  in  a  historical  address,  and  more 
than  once  in  his  writings  and  sermons,  was 
expressed  in  the  phrase  which  his  son  recalled 


170      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

in  announcing  his  death  in  the  paper  with 
which  his  name  has  been  so  long  associated 
as  to  make  dissociation  impossible :  ''  Our  duty 
to  make  the  past  a  success."  "  Unless  sons  are 
better  than  their  fathers,"  he  used  to  say, 
"  both  fathers  and  sons  are  a  failure."  And 
he  would  quote  the  line :  "  He  mourns  the  dead 
who  lives  as  they  desired."  This  would  be 
his  word  to  us  if  his  lips  could  speak  now. 
We  are  to  go  out  to  repeat,  to  expand  what 
w^e  have  seen  and  known  in  him.  May  the 
grace  of  God  go  with  us  as  we  strive  to  show 
forth  in  our  lives  what  we  saw  in  him  of 
that  character  which  is  divine,  and  of  that 
love  which  is  God! 


XII 

WILLIAM  ROGERS  RICHARDS 

A  STREAM  of  yellow  sunlight  on  the 
sloping  shoulder  of  a  New  England  hill 
touching  a  mass  of  granite  boulder  with 
warmth  and  radiance !  This  is  the  memory  of 
Dr.  Richards  which  comes  back  to  each  of 
us  who  knew  him,  as  a  man  opens  his  heart 
to  his  brother,  who  is  his  friend. 

He  was  the  granite  boulder.  To  recall  the 
broad,  overhanging  forehead,  the  steel  flash 
from  the  grey  and  deep-set  eyes,  the  firm  set 
of  the  thin  lips,  the  solid,  resolute  chin  beneath, 
with  the  controlled  muscular  alertness  of  the 
lithe  form;  to  recall  the  man  as  we  saw  him 
is  to  feel  again  the  tense  strength  and  firmness 
which  he  was.  He  came  of  old  New  England 
stock,  and  all  his  training  had  been  in  New 
England  schools,  and  while  for  many  years 
he  had  lived  in  mellower  climes,  he  never  quite 
lost  the  New  England  accent.  He  embodied 
the  Puritan  tone  and  uprightness.  It  appeared 
in  his  neat  carelessness  as  to  dress,  and  in  his 
loyalty  to  the  old  Puritan  moral  ideals.     We 

171 


172      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

saw  the  granite  in  him  in  the  clear  and  defi- 
nite sharpness  of  his  convictions,  in  the  auster- 
ity of  his  sense  of  duty,  and  in  the  sternness 
of  his  judgment  of  character.  In  the  best  of 
all  the  biographies  of  Stonewall  Jackson,  his 
British  admirer  tells  us  that  in  his  cadet  days 
at  West  Point,  Jackson  dealt  with  a  light  hand 
with  the  conventional  social  ideals,  choosing 
his  companions  quite  as  often  from  the  class 
below  him  as  from  his  own,  "  and  in  yet  an- 
other way,"  adds  Colonel  Henderson,  "  his 
strength  of  character  was  shown.  To  one  who 
w^as  guilty  of  dishonourable  conduct  he  was 
merciless  almost  to  vindictiveness.  He  had  his 
own  standards  of  right  and  wrong  and  from 
one  who  infringed  them  he  would  accept 
neither  apology  nor  excuse."  No  one  could 
have  said  this  about  Dr.  Richards.  I  doubt 
whether  it  is  truly  said  of  the  great  Christian 
soldier.  But  that  steadfastness  and  ethical 
tenacity  and  rigid  principle  which  gave  Jackson 
his  familiar  name,  were  all  in  Dr.  Richards  too. 
He  was  no  mincer  of  words;  he  was  a  fear- 
less smiter  of  what  needed  to  be  smitten.  We 
can  ask  of  him  as  our  Lord  asked  of  His 
friend,  "  What  went  ye  out  into  the  wilderness 
for  to  see?  A  reed  shaken  with  the  wind? 
But  what  went  ye  out  for  to  see?  A  man 
clothed  in  soft  raiment?     Behold,  they  which 


William  Rogers  Richards  173 

are  gorgeously  apparelled,  and  live  delicately, 
are  in  kings'  courts,"  Yes,  thank  God,  there 
was  granite  in  him.  Therefore,  men  who  were 
uncertain  or  aweary  could  rest  on  the  boulder 
and  rise  strengthened  and  assured. 

But  he  was  also  the  golden  sunlight.  It 
played  in  his  yellow  hair.  We  saw  it  in  the 
blue  love-looks  of  the  eyes  that  were  not  grey 
after  all,  and  it  sparkled  in  the  music  of  his 
laughter.  A  good  story  was  always  twice  as 
good  heard  in  the  echo  of  his  boundless  en- 
joyment of  it.  There  was  granite, — and  there 
was  also  gentleness.  We  remember  the  quiz- 
zical twist  of  the  head,  the  twitching  of  the 
thin  lips  before  the  jest  broke,  the  maiden-like 
sensitiveness  at  suffering,  and  the  shrinking 
hatred  of  giving  pain;  the  boyish  delight  in 
teasing,  the  divine  pleasure  in  small  things  and 
in  every  little  human  experience.  Oh,  rich 
indeed  is  our  memory  of  the  yellow  light, 
agleam  upon  his  head,  shining  with  candour 
over  all  his  life! 

The  sunlight  fell  on  a  boulder  on  the  hill- 
side beneath  the  open  skies.  The  life  we  knew 
was  open  to  all  the  winds  that  blew,  bared  to 
every  smile  and  frown  of  God,  not  cloistered, 
but  laid  out  upon  all  the  plain,  indisputable 
facts  of  life.  "  Creed  or  no  creed,  Bible  or  no 
Bible,"  he  said  once,  ''  here  are  the  facts," — 


174      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

facts  of  spring  flowers  laughing  on  the  hillside, 
facts  of  black,  scudding  storm  clouds  and  of 
winter  wrath.  To  deny  the  Christian  solution 
is  not  to  escape  from  the  facts — both  dark  and 
bright.  It  was  part  of  his  open  life  to  love 
the  fresh  air  and  the  trout  brooks  and  all  clean 
and  wholesome  games.  It  has  been  a  surprise 
to  some  who  did  not  know  him  well  and  who 
were  misled  by  the  slightly  stooping  shoulders 
and  the  almost  hectic  flush  upon  his  face,  to 
learn  that  he  was  of  such  tough  fibre  and  no 
mean  competitor  on  many  fields.  Perhaps, 
looking  back  now,  we  who  thought  he  could 
endure  everything  were  the  self-deceived. 
How  joyfully  we  recall  now  the  old  and  eager 
contests  of  which  half  the  zest  lay  in  his 
hatred  of  defeat !  He  was  never  built  for  van- 
quishment,  and  It  is  no  disloyalty  to  his  mem- 
ory to  admit  that  he  was  a  poor  loser.  If,  in 
the  land  where  he  has  gone  there  is  merri- 
ment, as  our  Lord  has  assured  us  there  is  also 
joy,  we  are  confident  that  he  is  laughing  glee- 
fully now  at  the  thought  of  our  recollections 
of  him  In  the  games  that  he  lost  and  hated  to 
lose,  which  were  not  as  many — we  must  be 
just — as  the  games  that  he  won  and  took  a 
boy's  joy  in  winning.  The  greatest  of  all 
sports  to  him  was  mountain  climbing  over  the 
hills  we  call  the  White  Mountains  and  over 


William  Rogers  Richards  175 

the  higher  peaks  of  Switzerland ;  and  in  a  land 
whose  altitudes  dwarf  all  these  I  have  gone 
up  the  lower  hills  with  him  and  listened  to  his 
lament,  as  he  looked  up  on  the  great  snow- 
clad  peaks,  that  every-day  duty  forbade  the 
heavenly  delight  of  a  climb  further  than  any 
he  had  known,  into  the  depthless  skies  of  God. 
This  going  to  the  very  top  or  end  of  things 
was  characteristic  of  him,  and  it  made  him 
the  true  scholar  that  he  was.  Scholarship  for 
mere  scholarship's  sake  was  no  lure  to  him. 
His  interest  was  always  in  life,  in  living  men 
and  living  women  and  most  of  all  in  living 
little  children.  But  as  a  minister  to  the  living 
and  to  life,  he  would  not  offer  what  he  did 
not  know,  or  give  what  he  himself  did  not 
live.  He  had  his  own,  firmly  wrought  out  the- 
ology, thought  cleanly  through  and  reasoned, 
as  God  has  always  bade  His  children  to  reason 
through  their  thought  of  Him  and  man  and 
duty.  I  was  told  once  of  the  examination  in 
the  Elizabeth  Presbytery  when  he  came  from 
New  England  to  the  church  in  Plainfield.  It 
lasted  the  whole  day  through  and  at  its  close 
old  Dr.  Kempshall  made  an  apology.  "  It  was 
no  ill  will.  Dr.  Richards,"  said  he,  "  no  ill  will 
toward  you.  It  was  just  pleasure  and  self- 
indulgence  for  us  to  listen  to  the  reasoned  con- 
victions of  a  man  who  had  thought  through  his 


176      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

truth  for  himself  and  knew  what  he  believed." 
Yes,  and  Dr.  Kempshall  might  have  added 
''  Whom."  He  had  his  own  original  theories 
regarding  Church  organization,  also.  He  had 
studied  carefully  the  methods  which  the  Apos- 
tolic and  the  sub-Apostolic  Church  had  used  in 
fitting  Christianity  to  municipal  life,  and  the 
convictions  to  which  he  came  were  embodied 
in  his  work  in  the  Crescent  Avenue  Church, 
with  its  half-dozen  affiliated  chapels  in  Plain- 
field,  New  Jersey.  And  in  religion,  out  of 
which  theology  and  ecclesiastic  polity  grew  and 
for  which  they  exist,  he  would  have  nothing 
second-hand  or  unreal.  For  all  holy  living  and 
divine  experience  in  other  souls  he  gave  thanks 
to  God,  but  he  w^ould  bring  to  men  not  a 
thought  which  he  had  read  in  a  book,  which 
another  man  had  thought,  not  a  view  of  God 
and  life  prescribed  by  this  or  that  authority, 
whether  in  philosophy  or  psychology.  Re- 
ligion, to  him,  had  its  rich  rootage  in  the  past, 
but  it  was  a  living  and  ever-expanding  self- 
revealing  of  God  in  the  soul.  As  such  it  must 
be  worthy  of  God  and  inclusive  of  all  that  was 
worthy  in  human  life.  Perhaps  this  was  the 
reason  that  he  disliked  Professor  James'  ''  Va- 
rieties of  Religious  Experience."  He  did  not 
care  for  some  of  these  ''  varieties."  And  also 
he  took  scant  pleasure  in  Myers'  great  book 


William  Rogers  Richards  177 

on  '^  Human  Personality,"  which  draws  to  the 
support  of  our  Christian  conception  of  the 
human  spirit  and  its  destiny,  the  results  of 
modern  psychical  research.  *'  If  these  utter- 
ances represent,"  he  told  me  once,  ''  the  intel- 
lectual quality  of  these  spirits,  I  would  fain 
spend  my  eternity  in  better  company."  Re- 
ligion, to  him,  was  not  something  abnormal, 
erratic.  Was  rehgion  not  the  relation  of  the 
human  soul  and  God,  the  ultimate  ground  of 
all  personal  and  social  life?  Moreover,  he  was 
also  not  of  those  who  think  that  the  physical 
sciences  alone  can  speak  with  clear  and  un- 
questioned tone.  No  theory  of  physical  sci- 
ence could  make  to  his  view  a  more  reasonable 
claim  than  was  made  by  each  one  of  those 
deep,  spiritual  realities  of  which,  in  the  golden 
days  that  are  gone,  we  heard  him  speak  as 
God's  prophet  and  our  friend. 

There  was  granite  strength  and  stability  in 
the  whole  cast  of  his  character  and  method 
of  his  thought.  His  scholarship  was  positive 
and  constructive  and  the  work  that  he  did 
was  a  creative  work.  In  none  of  his  utterances 
is  this  more  clearly  seen  than  in  "  God's  Choice 
of  Men,"  a  series  of  sermons  which  he 
preached  in  half -contemptuous  reply  to  a  news- 
paper charge  of  insincerity  against  all  those 
who  professed  to  hold  the  Church's  view  on  the 


178      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

character  of  God.  I  know  no  worthier  or 
nobler  vindication  of  all  that  is  eternally  true 
in  Calvinism,  with  its  fearless  facing  of  the 
actual  facts  of  the  universe  and  its  awful  rev- 
erence for  the  sovereign  God  and  its  unflinch- 
ing assertion  of  our  human  liberty.  Nowhere 
was  Dr.  Richards  more  himself  than  in  this 
large-minded,  forward-reaching,  loyal  procla- 
mation of  truth  that  was  only  Calvin's  because 
it  ought  to  be  every  man's.  Just  as  he  would 
not  turn  lightly,  and  after  the  foolish  fashion 
of  our  times,  against  the  granite  truth  in  Cal- 
vinism, so  did  he  cling  also  with  love  to  the 
old  creedal  symbols.  I  loved  all  things  in  him, 
but  nothing  more  than  his  fierce  refusal  to 
cut  out  of  the  Apostles'  Creed  the  noble  asser- 
tion of  the  limitless  love  of  God — "  He  de- 
scended into  Hell."  Where  else?  To  the 
uttermost  limit  of  the  outer  darkness  would 
He  not  go  seeking  and  saving  that  which  was 
lost?  He  built  steadfastly  on  the  abiding  truth 
of  ancient  symbols,  because  he  was  ever  a 
builder  and  not  a  destroyer,  whose  supreme 
concern  was  in  uplifting  and  not  in  pulling 
down. 

Nothing  that  ever  had  been  part  of  human 
life  and  no  record  of  the  deeds  and  experiences 
of  men  was  fruitless  to  his  thought.  His 
fresh  and  original  mind  drew  out  from  the 


William  Rogers  Richards  179 

apparently  driest  record  some  living  and  life- 
giving  truth.  I  know  of  no  better  illustration 
of  this  quality  of  his  mind  than  the  sermon 
which  none  who  heard  it  will  ever  forget,  on 
"  The  Monotony  of  Sin,"  from  the  oft-recur- 
ring phrase  in  the  books  of  Kings  and  Chron- 
icles— ''  He  departed  not  from  all  the  sins  of 
Jeroboam  the  son  of  Nebat,  wherewith  he  made 
Israel  to  sin."  For  months  after  that  sermon 
was  preached  in  Battell  Chapel,  at  Yale, 
phrases  from  it  lingered  in  the  college  ver- 
nacular. There  must  have  been  few  men  who 
heard  it  who  did  not  carry  with  them  for 
many  a  day  its  restrained  but  terrible  picture 
of  sin's  pitiless  dulness  and  mockery. 

It  was  in  part,  doubtless,  his  creative  in- 
terest and  instinct,  in  part,  doubtless,  the  mis- 
sionary temper  of  his  family  relationships 
bringing  him  into  admiring  intimacy  with  a 
great  missionary  character  in  Dr.  Blodgett,  but 
it  was  chiefly  his  own  spiritual  honesty  and 
generosity  and  his  contempt  for  the  idea  that 
the  gospel  is  a  personal  perquisite  instead  of 
a  heavenly  trust  for  all  humanity,  which  made 
him  the  ardent  missionary  spirit  which  we 
knew  him  to  be.  No  man  was  more  loyal  to 
immediate  local  responsibilities.  No  one  took 
up  such  responsibilities  more  adequately 
equipped  to  bear  them  by  the  world  breadth 


i8o      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

of  his  sympathy  and  the  world  interpretation 
which  the  gospel  bore  to  his  thought.  For 
twenty  years  he  served  as  a  member  of  the 
Presbyterian  Board  of  Foreign  Missions — for 
a  good  part  of  this  time  as  chairman  of  one  of 
its  most  important  committees,  and  his  share  in 
its  work  constituted  one  of  his  truest  pleasures 
in  life.  And  never  was  he  happier  in  preaching 
than  when  pleading  the  missionary  cause.  In 
the  sermon  which  he  preached  in  his  New 
York  church  on  "  The  Upper  Room,"  on  the 
text — "  The  Master  saith,  Where  is  the  guest 
chamber  where  I  shall  eat  the  Passover  with 
my  disciples?  And  he  will  show  you  a  large 
upper  room,  furnished  and  prepared.  There 
make  ready,"  he  said  that  he  had  once  preached 
a  foreign  missionary  sermon  on  this  text  and 
that  just  because  it  suggested  thoughts  so  near 
to  the  heart  of  the  gospel,  therefore  it  lent 
itself  to  the  missionary  construction.  "  And  I 
think,"  said  he,  "  that  there  is  no  other  kind 
of  appeal  that  brings  the  tones  of  the  Master 
Himself  more  distinctly  to  a  Christian  con- 
gregation." Every  other  cause,  he  felt,  had 
something  more  to  be  said  for  it  than  could 
be  said  for  Foreign  Missions.  The  very 
strength  of  this  cause  lay  in  the  fact  that  it 
was  a  pure  appeal  to  unselfishness,  and  that  it 
was  a  work  for  men  and  women  whom  we  had 


William  Rogers  Richards  i8i 

never  seen  and  who  could  do  nothing  to  recom- 
pense us;  that  it  contained  no  element  of  self- 
interest  or  of  compensation  in  any  form,  and 
that  to  plead  this  cause,  accordingly,  was  to 
open  to  the  Christian  mind  in  its  fullest  and 
most  unclouded  glory  the  divine  unselfishness 
of  the  Incarnation  itself. 

And  nothing  could  surpass  his  ingenuity  in 
the  choice  of  missionary  texts.  Wherever  he 
could  find  any  truth,  he  could  find  a  way  to 
this  richest  and  most  Christlike  of  all  truths. 
Many  who  heard  it  will  never  forget  a  striking 
missionary  appeal  which  he  drew  once  from 
the  text — "  And  he  from  within  shall  answer 
and  say.  Trouble  me  not.  The  door  is  now 
shut  and  my  children  are  with  me  in  bed.  I 
cannot  arise  and  give  thee."  But  I  think  the 
masterpiece  of  his  genius  in  this  matter  w^as 
the  missionary  sermon  which  he  preached 
from  Judah's  words  to  Joseph  as  he  stood 
before  the  new  Egyptian  ruler,  with  his  little 
brother  Benjamin  by  his  side,  and  thought  of 
the  lonely  old  man  in  Canaan,  longing  for  his 
absent  sons — *'  How  shall  I  go  up  to  my  father 
and  the  lad  be  not  with  me?"  That  was  a 
question  that  made  room  for  the  full  flaming 
blaze  of  his  conscience  and  all  the  yearning  of 
his  soul. 

And  the  home-driving  quality  of  these  texts 


1 82      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

was  truly  illustrative  of  the  man,  who  was 
no  generalizationist  in  his  teaching,  no  manip- 
ulator in  his  work,  no  theorizer  or  scheme 
builder.  He  was  wont  to  go  straight  to  the 
practical  heart  of  all  truth  and  duty.  He  was 
such  a  leader  of  others  as  he  was  because  he 
was  in  himself  a  tireless  worker.  The  prin- 
ciple that  it  is  better  to  set  ten  men  to  work 
than  to  do  the  work  of  ten  men  is  a  very 
much  overdone  principle,  and  it  overlooks  the 
simple  fact  that  the  only  man  who  is  likel}^  to 
have  about  him  inspiration  enough  to  set  ten 
other  men  to  work  must  be  a  man  in  whom  the 
energies  of  ten  such  lesser  men  as  need  this 
inspiration  are  concentred. 

But  I  turn  from  all  these  things  to  the  per- 
sonal flavour  of  his  spirit  and  the  quality  of 
his  friendships.  Much  of  this  flavour  and 
quality  sprang  from  the  depth  of  the  old  New 
England  reserve,  which  never  left  him.  There 
were  reticences  which  were  yet  revealings  and 
withholdings  which  were  the  richest  givings. 
It  was  this  reserve,  I  am  sure,  which  gave  him 
much  of  his  power.  You  never  heard  him 
speak  with  the  full  measure  of  his  voice. 
There  was  always  a  louder  tone  that  he  might 
have  used.  The  very  power  of  his  deepest  and 
richest  utterances  lay  in  the  feeling  which  he 
gave  you  that  there  were  depths  beneath  these 


William  Rogers  Richards  183 

depths.  How  well  I  remember  the  first  ser- 
mon I  ever  heard  him  preach,  in  Marquand 
Chapel  at  Princeton,  more  than  a  quarter  of 
a  century  ago.  The  sunlight  was  streaming 
in  through  the  southern  windows  and  fell  in 
a  pool  of  brightness  on  his  yellow  head  and 
the  clean,  firm  outlines  of  his  face.  He 
scarcely  raised  his  eyes  from  the  notes  before 
him,  but  there  was  a  tremor  in  the  voice  and 
a  sense  of  checked  and  resolute  power  which 
held  the  young  lives  in  front  of  him  still  but 
quivering.  I  am  not  sure  whether  it  was  his 
famous  sermon  on  Samson  or  not,  but  it  was 
a  sermon  which  embodied  the  truth  which  he 
loved  to  draw  from  that  pathetic  hero  of  a 
far  distant  age,  of  the  folly  of  strength  with- 
out reserves  of  power,  without  the  chains  that 
bind  it  to  achievement. 

And  it  was  this  same  reserve  of  temper  and 
of  thought  which  gave  such  tenderness  to  his 
sympathy.  Many  of  us  recall  him  best  when 
he  came  to  us  as  a  comforter  and  gave  gifts 
whose  value  came  from  their  cost  to  the  giver. 
It  w^as  a  pain  that  was  all  joy  to  him  to  fulfil 
this  ministry.  He  wept  under  it,  but  with  that 
deepest  weeping  which  is  tearless.  He  was  one 
of  those  to  whom  the  richest  spiritual  ex- 
pression is  not  easy.  It  was  the  difficulty  that 
gave  it  its  fragrance  and  its  power.    Mr.  Pat- 


i84      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

terson  Du  Bois,  in  his  Httle  book,  "  Beckon- 
ings  of  Little  Hands,"  tells  of  a  little  child 
of  his  own  who  was  never  known  in  his  short 
life  to  mention  the  name  of  God,  and  there 
were  fears  that  the  child's  silence  sprang  from 
some  spiritual  atrophy  or  defect,  until,  after  it 
had  gone  to  join  those  other  children  singing 
round  the  Throne,  a  note-book  was  found  in 
which  the  baby  hand  had  written,  in  letters 
that  sprawled  up  the  page — "  God  is  love.  He 
loves  lambs."  It  was  not  that  the  child  lacked 
the  thought  of  God;  the  thought  lay  too  deep 
for  the  sensitive  spirit  to  uncover. 

His  reserves  were  no  check,  however,  on 
the  enthusiasm  of  his  loyalties.  His  friends 
knew  they  were  his  friends  and  the  world  knew 
it.  And  beyond  his  personal  friendships  there 
were  three  great  fidelities  in  which  he  gave 
himself  with  fulness  and  without  reserve.  I 
have  been  speaking  of  his  faithfulness  as  a 
minister  of  Christ;  but  he  joined  to  this  loy- 
alty the  other  two  of  which  he  had  often 
sung — "  For  God,  for  country,  and  for 
Yale." 

And  now  and  then,  even  in  his  spiritual 
utterances,  he  told  us  as  much  as  man  can  tell. 
One  such  time  at  least  many  will  recall,  when 
in  the  Brick  Church  in  New  York  City  we  had 
met  together  both  to  mourn  and  to  rejoice 


William  Rogers  Richards  185 

when  that  remarkable  personality  Mrs.  Whit- 
man, or  Janet  McCook  as  we  knew  her,  had 
finished  her  brief  and  glorious  life  here,  and 
we  believed  we  could  almost  hear  the  trumpets 
sounding  for  her  on  the  other  side.  Then  in 
the  prayer  which  expressed  nothing  which 
silence  could  best  express  and  left  unexpressed 
nothing  which  could  be  put  in  speech,  he  said 
to  God  for  us  and  to  us  for  God  all  God  could 
give  to  be  said,  and  in  the  completeness  of 
his  utterance  of  what  we  felt  or  wanted  to 
feel,  revealed  himself  without  reserve  and  yet 
wholly  concealed,  and  we  knew  that  even  then 
what  had  been  so  long  growing  before  us  was 
made  well-nigh  complete.  Like  the  Upper 
Room  of  which  he  had  delighted  to  preach, 
he,  too,  was  prepared  and  furnished. 

And  now  when  we  look  out  on  the  hillside 
where  once  he  was,  the  boulder  which  we  used 
to  see  and  by  which  we  were  wont  to  rest 
is  gone,  and  the  sunlight  that  used  to  fall  upon 
it  is  elsewhere  shining,  but  we  have  still,  and 
of  this  nothing  can  bereave  us,  ''  the  beloved 
memory  of  a  righteous  man  who  loved  God 
and  truth  above  all  things,  a  man  of  untar- 
nished honour,  loyal  and  chivalrous,  tender 
and  true,  modest  and  humble,  gentle  and 
strong,  pitiful  to  the  weak,  yearning  after  the 
erring,  stern  to  all  forms  of  wrong  and  of 


1 86      Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

oppression,  yet  most  stern  to  himself,  who 
being  angry  yet  sinned  not,  who  lived  unto 
God  here,  and  passing  through  the  grave  and 
gate  of  death,  now  liveth  unto  God  forever- 
more." 


f  I  V 


XIII 

CONCLUSION 

^^r  I  ^HESE  all  died  in  faith,  not  having 
received  the  promises,  but  having 
seen  them  and  greeted  them  from 
afar,  and  having  confessed  that  they  were 
strangers  and  pilgrims  on  the  earth.  For  they 
that  say  such  things  make  it  manifest  that  they 
are  seeking  after  a  country  of  their  own.  And 
if  indeed  they  had  been  mindful  of  that  coun- 
try from  which  they  went  out,  they  would 
have  had  opportunity  to  return.  But  now  they 
desire  a  better  country,  that  is,  a  heavenly; 
wherefore  God  is  not  ashamed  of  them,  to  be 
called  their  God;  for  He  hath  prepared  for 
them  a  city.   .    .    . 

"  And  these  all,  having  had  witness  borne 
to  them  through  their  faith,  received  not  the 
promise,  God  having  provided  some  better 
thing  concerning  us,  that  apart  from  us  they 
should  not  be  made  perfect.'' 


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187 


BIOGRAPHY 


SUN  VAT  SEN 

Sun  Yat  Sen 

And  the  Awakening  of  China.  By  James  Cantlie, 
MA.,  M.B.,  and  C.  Sheridan  Jones.     Net  $1.25. 

The  world  has  known  but  few  patriots  equal  to  Sun  Yat 
Sen.  _  A  man  of  absolute  devotion,  highest  principle,  un- 
questioned character.  For  twenty-five  years,  the  author.  Dr. 
Cantlie  has  been  the  close  friend  of  the  Chinese  patriot. 
The  narrative  is  therefore  one  of  intimate  appreciation. 

ARTHUR  T.  PIERSON,  P.P. 

Arthur  T.  Pierson 

Spiritual  Warrior,  Mighty  in  the  Scriptures  and 
Apostle  of  Modern  Missions.  A  Biography  by  His 
Son,  Delavan  Leonard  Pierson.  Illustrated,  net  $1.50. 

Dr.  Pierson  as  a  preacher,  lecturer  and  writer  on 
Missionary  and  Bible  themes,  touched  the  hearts  and  in- 
fluenced the  lives  of  thousands.  His  son  has  with  skillful 
hand  inscribed  the  annals  of  his  father's  life.  This  intimate 
account  of  his  career  is  a  notable  and  most  welcome  addition 
to   Christian  biography. 

ROBERT  E.  SPEER 

Men  Who  Were  Found  Faithful 

i2mo,  cloth,  net  $1.00 

I^ike  the  author's  "Young  Men  Who  Overcame,"  this 
book  is  a  series  of  biographical  studies  of  men  and  women 
who,  in  the  public  work  of  the  world,  or  in  quietness  of  pri- 
vacy, have  illustrated  the  highest  Christian  ideals  ©f  loyalty 
and  self-forgetfulness. 

JOHN  T.  PARIS,  P.  D. 

Men  Who  Made  Good 

l2mo,  cloth,  net  $1.25. 

These  twenty-six  brief  biographies  of  men  who  have 
attained  distinction  form  a  volume  of  great  inspirational 
value  and  a  fitting  companion  to  the  author's  earlier  book 
MAKING  GOOD.  Dr.  Paris  tells  the  life  story  of  busi- 
ness men,  statesmen,  philanthropists,  authors,  scientists  and 
artists,  in  a  vivid,  entertaining  style.  It  is  a  book  that 
will  stimulate  boys  and  young  men  to  bravery,  to  persist- 
ence, to  kindliness,  to  whole-hearted  Christian  living — a  book 
that  parents  and  teachers  and  "Big  Brother"  workers  will 
welcome. 


MISSIONS,  BIOGRAPHICAL 

■r    '  '  '  ■"  ; 


DR.  GEORGE  BROWN 

The  Life  of  Dr.  George  Brown 

Pioneer,  Explorer  and  Missionary.  An  Autobiography, 
•with  III  illustrations  and  map.     8vo,  Cloth,  net  $3.50. 

"Since  the  appearance  of  John  G.  Paton's  Autobiography 
•\ve  have  read  no  work  of  such  entrancing  interest.  It  is  a, 
narrative  of  this  pioneer  missionary's  forty-eight  years  of 
residence  and  travel  in  Samoa,  New  Britain,  New  Ireland, 
New   Guinea,   and  the   Solomon  Islands." — British  Weekly. 

JESSE  PAGE,  F.  R.  G.  S. 

The  Black  Bishop  s.^J^^^.^e. 

Preface  by  Kugene  Stock,  D.  C.  L.,  with  frontispiece, 
sixteen  illustrations  and  map.     8vo,   Cloth,   net  $2.00. 

'"Ihe  simple  life-story,  told  mainly  by  himself,  of  a 
West  African  who  was  a  kidnapped  slave  when  a  boy  of  fif- 
teen and  forty-three  years  later  became  the  first  negro  bishop 
of  the  Church  of  England.  Much  information  is  given  be- 
side the  biographical  details,  about  the  problems  presented 
by  the  Nigerian  peoples  to  their  white  rulers  and  particularly 
of  the  extent,  influence  and  probable  future  of  the  Moham- 
medan invasion." — Nation. 

W.  H.  T.  GAIRDNER,  B.  A. 

O    M    Thornton     ^  Study  in  Missionary 
U.  iVl.    A  Ut^nilUU        jjg^jg  g^^j  Methods. 

Nine  illustrations,  i2mo.   Cloth,   net  $1.25. 

"The  Student  Movement"  says:  "It  is  likely  to  dominate 
the  thoughts  of  the  missionary  thinker  for  many  years." 
Devoted  largely  to  experiences  in  Egypt  and  lessons  gath- 
ered on  this  field — it  tells  of  a  man  who  devoted  his  intel- 
lectual powers  to  thinking  out  the  wider  problems  of  the 
evangelization  of  the  world  and  the  spread  of  Christian  in- 
stitutions in  Mission  lands. 

GEORGE  HAWKER 

The  Life  of  George  Grenfell, 

Congo  Missionary  and  Explorer 

Illustrated,   8vo,   Cloth,  net  $2.00. 

"This  may  be  regarded  as  a  companion  volume  to  Sir 
Harry  Johnston's  'George  Grenfell  and  the  Congo' — it  was, 
indeed,  originally  arranged  that  Sir  Harry  Johnston  and  Mr. 
Hawker  should  collaborate  in  a  single  volume  as  a  memorial 
to  one  of  the  greatest  names  in  the  annals  of  equatorial 
Africa." — London    Times. 

REV.  JAMES  WELLS,  D.  D. 

Stewart  of  Lovedale 

The  Romance  of  Missions  in  Africa  told  in  the  Lite  of 
James  Stewart,  D.  A.,  M.  D.,  F.  R.  G.  S.  With  forty-two 
illustrations  and  two  maps.     8vo,  Cloth,   net  $1.50. 

"We  may  heartily  congratulate  Dr.  Wells  on  having 
•written  a  book  that  will  live,  and  more  than  that,  a  book  that 
■will  create  life  wherever  it  is  read." — Dr.  Robertson  Nicoll, 
in  the  British   Weekly. 


FOREIGN  MISSIONS— BIOGRAPHY 


DANIEL  McGILVARY,  P.P. 

A  Half  Century  Among  the  Siamese 
and  the  Lao 

An  Autobiography  of  Daniel  McGilvary,  D.D. 
With  an  Introduction  by  Arthur  J.  Brown,  D.D. 
Illustrated,  i2mo,  cloth,  net  $2.00. 

There  is  no  more  fascinating-  story  in  fiction,  or  in  that 
truth  which  is  stranger  than  fiction  The  years  of  toil  and 
privation  of  loneliness  and  sometimes  of  danger;  how  the 
missionaries  persevered  with  splendid  faith  and  courage  until 
the  foundations  of  a  prosperous  mission  were  laid  are  por- 
traved  with  graphic  power.  It  is  a  book  of  adventure  and 
human  interest  and  a  notable  contribution  to  American  for- 
eign missionary  literature." — iPresbyterian  Banner. 

WILLIAM  ELLIOT  GRTFFIS,  D.D,,  L.H.D. 

A  Modern  Pioneer  in  Korea 

The  Life  Story  of  Henry  G.  Appenzeller.  Illus- 
trated, i2mo,  cloth,  net  $1.25. 

TTiis  life  is  another  stirring  chapter  in  the  record  of 
modern  missionary  heroism.  The  author's  name  is  a  guar- 
antee of  its  thoroughness,  accuracy  and  interest.  Dr.  Griffis 
has  woven  a  most  picturesque^  and  interesting  background  of 
Korean  landscape,  life  and  history.  It  is  a  book  that  will 
win  interest  in  missionary  effort. 

MARGARET  E.  BURTON 

Notable  Women  of  Modern  China 

Illustrated,  i2mo,  cloth,  net  $1.25. 

TTie  author's  earlier  work  on  the  general  subject  of 
Wbmen's  Education  in  China,  indicates  her  ability  to  treat 
with  peculiar  interest  and  discernment  the  characters  making 
up  this  volume  of  striking  biographies.  If  these  women  are 
types  to  be  followed  by  a  great  company  of  like  aspirations 
the    future   of   the   nation  is   assured. 

ROBERT  McCHEYNE  MATEER 

Character-Building  in  China 

The  Life  Story  of  Julia  Brown  Mateer.  Illustra- 
ted, i2mo,  cloth,  net  $1.00. 

"Gives  a  vivid,  many-sided  picture  of  missionary  work. 
It  is,  in  fact,  an  answer  to  such  questions  as,  How  is  mis- 
sionary life  practically  lived?  It  is  of  engrossing  interest 
alike  to  the  advocates  of  missionary  work  and  general  readers 
who  enjoy  real  glimpses  of  foreign  and  pagan  civilization." — 
Presbyterian   Advance, 


CriRISTOLOGY 

*■  '"  - "■_ 

PHILIP  VOLLMER,   Ph.  D. ,  D.  D. 

The  Modern  Student's  Life  of  Chri^ 

i2mo,  cloth,  net  $i.oo. 

Students,  Higher  Institutions  of  Learning,  Advanced  Bible 
School  Classes,  and  other  organizations  will  find  in  this 
thorough-going  volume  a  text  book  that  combines  the  results 
of  the  very  best  modern  scholarship  with  a  spiritual  presenta- 
tion of  the  subject  that  will  stir  the  heart  and  conscience. 

Part  I.       Introduction   to    the    Life    of    Christ. 

Part  II.     Ihe   Events  of  the   Life   of  Christ. 

Part  III.  General   Aspects   of  the   Life   of   Christ. 

JOSEPH  FORT  NEWTON 

The  Eternal  Chri^ 

Studies  in  the  Life  of  Vision  and  Service.  Net  $i.oo. 

The  sanity,  reverence  and  exquisite  literary  finish  of 
these  essays  will  capture  the  affection  of  every  discerning 
reader.  Mr.  Newton  handles  his  subject  as  one  who  is 
familiar  with  the  inner  things  of  humanity.  He  moves  among 
the  poets,  sages  and  scientists,  as  one  who  has  lived  long  in 
the  corridors  of  some  great  treasure  house  of  art  and  knows 
the  objects  most   worthy  attention. 

HERBERT  L    WILLETT,    Ph.D.  Professor  in  the 

'  " University  of  Chicag* 

The  Call  of  The  Christ 

A  Study  of  the  Challenge  of  Jesus  to  the  Present 
Century.     i2moy  cloth,  net  $i.oo. 

"Seldom  has  the  challenge  of  Jesus  to  the  present  cen- 
tury been  presented  so  earnestly,  so  persuasively.  As  a 
vital,  living,  convincing  portrayal  of  Qhrist,  scholarly  yet 
simple,  positive  but  not  dogmatic,  spiritual  but  not  pietistic, 
it  is  a  delight  and  an  inspiration." — Record-Herald. 

GEORGE  CLARKE  PECK,  D.D. 

The  Method  of  the  Master 

A  Study  of  the  Clinics  of  Jesus.  Introduction  by 
S.  Parkes  Cadman,  D.D.     i2mo,  cloth,  net  $i.oo. 

These  studies  in  the  problems  of  the  hour  are  timely 
and  suggestive.  They  cover  well  nigh  the  entire  range  of 
human  ills  and  they  apply  to  these  "diseases  of  our  hearts" 
the  balm  of  the  great  physician.  The  author  has  a  message 
that  will  stir  men's  minds  and  souls,  and  spur  to  action. 

€.  A,   JOHNSTON'  ROSS,  M,  A, 

The  Cross  :  The  Report  of  a  Misgiving 

i6mo,  boards,  net  25c. 

"He  strikes  a  fresh  note  of  lofty  and  sustained  Interest. 
He  shows  a  reverent  familiarity  with  every  great  topic,  a 
wide  understanding  of  spiritual  meaning,  a  force  and  beauty 
of  expression  which  command  the  closest  attention."— C/im- 
tian  Advocate^ 


Pnnceion  Theologi 


C3l  Sem,nary-Speer  Ubra-y 


77oi2  01084  7020 


Date  Due 

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